#david hendricks

Quick Review of the True Crime Books I Read in 2019 (Part 1)

Review of Books in 2018 Part 1 and Part 2

Review of books in 2017 Part 1 and Part 2

Review of books in 2016 Part 1 and Part 2

Review of books in 2015

Reasonable Doubt by Steve Vogel: One of the best titles I read this year was this very thorough account of the Hendricks murders, a mother and her three kids who were butchered with an ax and a knife in their home in Illinois in 1983. The husband and father, David Hendricks, was sent to prison but acquitted in a second trial seven years later, because there really wasn’t any concrete evidence against him other than a dubious motive. Vogel is one of the journalists that covered the case from the first day and he does a great job of going deep into the investigation and the trial, and also into who David Hendricks and the victims were. I’ve seen people comment that this book takes you to the jury box and I think that’s an accurate description, because you’re constantly weighing the evidence and trying to come up with a fair verdict. Vogel eventually reached the conclusion that Hendricks wasn’t guilty (at least in the legal sense) but he tried his best to portray all the evidence as fairly and balanced as possible, letting the readers come up with our own conclusions.

Wrecking Crew by John Ferak: This book is a slightly more in depth retelling of what you saw in the second season of Making a Murderer and a completely unnecessary read, in my opinion, unless you’re a die hard fan of defense lawyer Kathleen Zellner or are so convinced of Steven Avery’s innocence that you just want to read all over again why the police and the state of Wisconsin have screwed him over endlessly. My problem with this book is that I don’t feel it even tries to be a nuanced portrayal and investigation. The author is clearly set on showing what a corrupt system surrounds the whole Avery case, but at times it really seems like it’s just Zellner talking through him instead of it being an independent analysis, so I really struggled with its credibility. And I’m one of those that think the Avery case is very messed up, can’t imagine anyone who is convinced of his guilt enjoying this.

Obsession by John Douglas and Mark Olshaker: As always, former FBI profiling pioneer John Douglas offers a great selection of chilling cases with poignant and intriguing analysis, in this case focusing on crimes against women that involve stalking and rape. It’s not his best book and it feels a little dated at moments, since it was published in 1998 and for example the whole first section of the book talks about some unidentified serial killer in Wichita that we now know it’s Dennis Rader. Douglas also does something I haven’t seen in other books of his, and includes quotes and opinions from other people: one of them is Linda Fairstein, who maybe at the time of this writing was some champion of women’s rights but now we are aware of her unethical actions in the Central Park Five case and her connections to rapist Harvey Weinstein, so eww. There’s also a large section about a victim advocacy group and some of their recommendations and while it’s important information it kind of drags and, again, feels very dated in this day and age.

Murder in the Stacks by David DeDok: The case in itself is certainly interesting: this book covers the murder of  Betsy Aardsma, who was stabbed in the middle of Penn State’s library in 1969, and to this day no one has been convicted for it. Investigative journalist David DeKok goes pretty deep into Betsy’s life and in his own theory of who killed her, exploring the alleged culprit’s life as well (and boy is he a piece of work). It’s always both thrilling and complex to read a non fiction book claiming a version as an absolute truth, but I’ll say that DeDok certainly makes a good case to support his claims. That being said, Murder in the Stacks wasn’t the most compelling read in terms of narrative and I’ve already forgotten big chunks of it so I’m not sure if that’s very promising.

Cold Kill by Jack Olsen: Jack Olsen is one of the better respected true crime authors, even though reading his books you’ll often think you’re actually reading fiction. His writing style, which I can only assume comes from thorough and rigorous investigation, is getting in the minds of the people involved in the crimes, in this case, one of the killers, so by the time the crime actually happens you’re deeply invested in these people and everything is more impactful. Cold Kill tells the story of David West, a guy with some serious issues and conceptions about women and life, and how his toxic relationship with a woman named Cindy Ray Campbell (who at times makes Karla Homolka seem saintly) led to the murder of two people for no good reason other tan greed and stupidity. It’s a very well written book and the case in itself is both sad and fascinating. Recommended.

Targeted by M. William Phelps: I was thoroughly confused by this book and the author’s intentions. It is presented as an “excellent piece of journalistic investigation” into Tracy Forlson, a sheriff’s deputy who was convicted for murdering her boyfriend but she claims she was framed because she was accusing her department of sexual harassment. The summary of the book will tell you that it will “lead to questions about her guilt”, but to me at least that wasn’t true. This book more seemed like a personal vendetta of Phelps against Forlson because, as he says through the story, he felt she was trying to manipulate him and his ego couldn’t handle it. It’s a weird, ranting book with large sections of his interactions with Tracy and constantly repeating that she’s a CONVICTED MURDERER and how dare she tell him this or that, all after another ranting prologue of Phelps whining about the reputation of true crime authors. I finished the novel not coming even close to doubting Tracy’s guilt and pretty annoyed with Phelp’s defensiveness and arrogance.

A Clockwork Murder by Steve Jackson: Steve Jackson is very good at bringing to life lesser known crimes, which is kind of surprising because the crimes he writes about are often horrific. In this case, the book covers the abduction and murder of Jacine Galinski in 1997, although it mostly tells the story of the two killers, George Woldt and Lucas Salmon, a pair of despicable, sick human beings who you get to know more than you’d like to through Jackson’s compelling narrative. Can’t say it will be a book you’ll never forget but it’s certainly worth the read if you’re interested in the workings of criminal minds.

A Case of Reasonable Doubt

During the whole day of November 8, 1983, David Hendricks tried to reach his family back home in Bloomington, Illinois, without success. He had left the previous night on a business trip to Wisconsin, and it wasn’t like his wife Susan to not answer phone calls. When she failed to make it to a family dinner that night, and after David contacted police at least twice, presuming she’d been in a car accident, cops did a welfare check on her and was met with a horrific scene.

Susan Hendricks (30) and her three children --Rebekah (9), Grace (7) and Benjamin (5)-- were lying dead in their beds in the middle of a gory scene. They had been all savagely hacked with an axe and a butcher knife; both weapons were found at the crime scene. There were no signs of struggle, so police theorized they’d been attacked in their sleep, and there were no signs of forced entry either, although the back door was found unlocked.

When David Hendricks arrived back home that same night, he immediately became the main suspect of the detectives in charge. They thought he looked too calm and resigned to the news his family had been murdered, and they didn’t like how he told the press that it had apparently being a burglary gone wrong, because he hadn’t even gone inside the house. Hendricks would later say that’s what someone who’d been there had told him.

Hendricks was 29 at the time, and a very successful businessman. He’d created and patented a popular orthopedic back brace and was making a lot of money with it, that’s why he occasionally left town for business trips and, according to his assistant, it wasn’t unusual for him to leave in the middle of the night. It also required him to meet with several models that were photographed wearing custom-made braces in medical brochures.

He was also a conservative Christian, part of a branch known as the Plymouth Brethen, which was strongly against divorce. After Hendricks was arrested on December 5, 1983, the prosecution came up with the theory that he wanted to pursue other sexual relationships, but because he didn’t want to lose his stand with his community by divorcing or cheating on his wife, he’d decided to kill his family instead. At one point they also pushed forward a more frankly absurd version of this, claiming that David had seen the “temptations of the world” and wanted to protect his family from them, so he’d chosen to “send them to Heaven”.

Needless to say, David Hendricks denied any involvement with the murders and, as you can see in the picture above, he looked appropriately devastated in their funerals. He told authorities that on November 7, 1983, Susan had gone to a baby shower on a nearby town and he’d taken the kids to a Chuck E’ Cheese, where they had eaten vegetarian pizza and played until around 7:30 pm. Afterwards, they’d gone to a bookmobile, where the kids had returned some books and borrowed new ones. A witness confirmed seeing them there at 8 pm.

David said he’d then gone back home and put the kids to bed at around 9:30 pm. Susan had arrived around 10:30 pm, and they’d talked for a while before he left for his trip some time after 11 pm, while everyone was still alive and safe.

During trial, David’s account of the events were put in doubt by the prosecution experts. One of them testified that, after analyzing the children’s stomach contents and finding undigested vegetables from the pizza they’d eaten, their estimated time of death was 9:30 pm, while David was still in the house, meaning he had to be the killer.

However, this evidence had its problems as well. First, with the advance of science we now know that using stomach contents to pinpoint time of death is not as accurate as we used to think, because there’s many factors that play into digestion, including the person’s age and health, among others. Leaving that aside, witnesses at the babyshower claim Susan didn’t leave before 9:40 pm, meaning she would have arrived home after her kids were murdered. Since she was a devoted mother, it’s hard to believe she wouldn’t have gone to check on them when she got home, but she was found murdered in her bed, after getting settled to sleep, which implies she either didn’t see her kids or checked on them and found nothing wrong.

Since they didn’t have any other evidence linking David to the crime, not even in the murder weapons, prosecution put most of the focus of the case in establishing motive. They called more than thirteen models who had worked with Hendricks and tried to show an “escalation of sexual aggression” in his behavior towards them, although they didn’t call them in the correct order they had actually modeled for him. Most of the statements from the models showed David was a bit of a creep, asking them for unnecessary nudity and doing some awkward groping while trying on the braces. One of them testified she believed David wanted to kiss her, and another that he had asked her to show her around town and had attempted to kiss her on the cheek during said “date”. However, models also said that Hendricks never restrained them by force and that he always backed off when they let him know they were uncomfortable. (You can read a summary of the models’ testimonies here).

The defense claimed that the stomach content analysis was dubious, since one of them even showed rests of a vegetable the child hated and wouldn’t eat, suggesting the lab had some mix-up. They also presented an expert who said that blood spatter at the crime scene suggested two killers instead of one.

Eventually, the jury found David Hendricks guilty of the murders. Although a case of this nature would have guaranteed the death penalty, Judge Richard Baner, who presided over the trial. refused to apply it and gave him four consecutive life sentences instead. He explained his reasoning, saying that, although he thought that Hendricks “probably did commit” the murders, he wasn’t convinced of his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

Hendricks appealed, and although at first the court affirmed his conviction, in 1991 the Illinois Supreme Court overturned it and granted him a new trial. This time they didn’t allow the models’ testimonies of David’s flirting, because it was considered by the court that they were more prejudicial than probative. Without the means to back their motive for the crime, the prosecution was forced to rely only on the actual evidence of the murders, and since it was so weak, the jury ended up acquitting Hendricks and he was released from prison after spending 7 years behind bars.

In one of his court filings, David Hendricks said he believed his brother in law John Lewis, who was at the time married to one of Susan’s sisters, had committed the murders. When that couple separated, Lewis’ ex wife said publicly she thought David had hired John to kill his family. Police claimed they ruled him out as a suspect after he passed a polygraph.

The rest of Susan’s family, including her parents, have always remained on David’s side and believe him to be innocent. Some, however, still think he did it and got away with a very light sentence.

first posted in facebook april 28, 2025

davd hendricks -- "popham beach sunset" (1984)

"popham beach is the beach that my family always visited during my childhood" … beth comeau (natural resources council of maine)

"'popham beach sunset', is a marvel of colored pencil done in large scale, atypical of a medium which lends itself to small detail and size. hendricks deftly creates a striking, unified image, built of thousands of small colored pencil marks. within these marks he captures the golden hour’s last strong bursts of sunlight, the moment when land is on the precipice of shifting into inky blackness against the sky" … boise art museum

"higher than the sounds you're singing higher than the sleeping cities far above steeples and chimneys rollercoasters and lighthouses far below where they're asleep dreaming i remember treading water popham beach, broken sand dollars afternoon in greenwood garden" … anna "nesey" gallons