Serial Killer Buried Murder Kits Across the Country
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FBI(NEW YORK) — Israel Keyes, the Alaskan man who confessed to seven murders before killing himself in a jail cell, told police that he traveled the country to find victims and buried caches of weapons, money and tools for disposing of bodies to use in future crimes.
The FBI also released an ominous list of 35 trips Keyes made around the U.S., Mexico and Canada over the last eight years.
Keyes, 34, the owner of an Anchorage construction company, was in jail charged with the February murder of Samantha Koenig, 18. While in jail he had been confessing to at least seven other killings in Washington, New York and Vermont. He was found dead in his Alaska jail cell on Sunday in an apparent suicide.
Investigators are now piecing together a deadly puzzle that is uncovering a macabre lifestyle of Keyes traveling to kill simply because he “liked to do it,” prosecutors said.
“In a series of interviews with law enforcement, Keyes described significant planning and preparation for his murders, reflecting a meticulous and organized approach to the crimes,” the Anchorage FBI office said in a statement.
The FBI has released a timeline of Keyes’ travels that showed nearly three dozen trips between 2004 and 2012. The destinations of the trips are vague, described only by U.S. region in most cases, but span the entire country, including Hawaii. There are also trips to Canada and Mexico listed.
Authorities have already recovered two caches, one in Alaska and one in New York, that contained money, weapons and items for disposing of bodies. Keyes indicated that there were other supply boxes buried across the country.
He funded his travel with the proceeds from bank robberies, authorities said.
“Investigators believe that Keyes did not know any of his victims prior to their abductions,” the FBI said. “He described several remote locations that he frequented to look for victims–parks, campgrounds, trailheads, cemeteries, boating areas, etc.”
Authorities wouldn’t say how Keyes killed himself, only that he was alone in his cell. An autopsy will be conducted.
Keyes owned a construction company in Anchorage. According to the website for Keyes Construction at the time of his arrest, Keyes worked in Washington State in the mid-1990s and then served three years in the Army infantry, stationed in Fort Lewis, Fort Hood, and Sinai, Egypt. According to the site, he then worked from 2001 to 2007 for the Makah Tribal Council in Neah Bay, Wash., before moving to Alaska.
The FBI is asking for the public’s assistance with any information about Keyes’ travels in order to identify additional victims. They ask that anyone with information contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio