Uploaded December 2019 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago
On March 23, 1987, Philadelphia police officers responded to an astonishing 9-1-1 call from Josefina Rivera. Claiming to have been abducted, raped, beaten, tortured, and held captive in a basement for nearly four months, she had managed to convince her captor to be allowed to see her family. She used the opportunity to escape and led the police to her abductor waiting at the gas station: Gary Heidnik. What they uncovered in Heidnik's basement was a prison that had claimed the lives of two women, with another three women held captive.
Four years later, in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, two police officers are flagged down by a handcuffed man, Tracy Edwards. He, too, claimed to have escaped from a would-be abductor, leading the police back to his house. It was thus almost by accident that police had finally caught one of the most infamous serial killers of all time, for the man's name was Jeffrey Dahmer.
Note that this program was made in 1996. Gary Heidnik was executed by lethal injection on 6 July 1999. As of 2020, he remains the last person to be executed in Pennsylvania.
On March 23, 1987, Philadelphia police officers responded to an astonishing 9-1-1 call from Josefina Rivera. Claiming to have been abducted, raped, beaten, tortured, and held captive in a basement for nearly four months, she had managed to convince her captor to be allowed to see her family. She used the opportunity to escape and led the police to her abductor waiting at the gas station: Gary Heidnik. What they uncovered in Heidnik's basement was a prison that had claimed the lives of two women, with another three women held captive.
Four years later, in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, two police officers are flagged down by a handcuffed man, Tracy Edwards. He, too, claimed to have escaped from a would-be abductor, leading the police back to his house. It was thus almost by accident that police had finally caught one of the most infamous serial killers of all time, for the man's name was Jeffrey Dahmer.
Note that this program was made in 1996. Gary Heidnik was executed by lethal injection on 6 July 1999. As of 2020, he remains the last person to be executed in Pennsylvania.
