Ch:43:Susan Beth Haab:Almost Home

    

  18 year old Susan Haab was almost home.  She had worked that day as an office assistant placed by a temp agency. She was back in Indianapolis on Thanksgiving and Term Break from Ball State University and was trying to earn a little extra money. It was Tuesday December 3rd 1968 and she was scheduled to work again the next day as well. She had gone out that evening with a friend and was returning home just after midnight. 

   She was driving southbound at 12:20 a.m on Kessler Boulevard North Drive and was only a quarter of a mile from her parent’s home. 

   She had dressed very smartly and casually in preppy brown Bermuda Shorts, long white socks, a white blouse and brown shoes. 

   It was a normal drive home until something unexpected happened on her street.  No one saw how the incident began but several neighbors saw the aftermath. Susan’s car was parked with the lights on and the door open. Her purse and jacket were left inside.  Susan had run across the street and frantically knocked on the door of 3551 Kessler Boulevard Drive North. She was running from an assailant who was shooting at her. On this quiet street with its large lawns and ranch style homes; Susan was running for her life. 

   After knocking and realizing that the door wouldn’t be opened quickly enough she turned North and attempted to run to the next house. She was struck by three bullets and fell on the lawn. 

   A young man with a light colored car was seen fleeing the scene. Two witnesses said that he walked to his car which was parked in front of Susan’s.  He didn’t run. He walked. He walked back to his car. 

   He was described as a “tall, young, white person in light colored clothing”.

   The house she had knocked at belonged to a retired police officer. His wife was home and heard the knock and one gunshot.  Other witnesses said that they heard three gunshots. Susan’s death certificate lists gunshot wounds to the head, neck and thorax as the cause of death. Numerous newspaper articles mention a fourth wound to the lower left leg. She was still breathing when first responders arrived but died shortly after. 

   One theory was that the first bullet struck her in the leg and took her down and that the others were fired at a closer point blank range. 

   Her friends and relatives were questioned. Young men that she had known at high school were questioned. Some were given lie detector tests. Men arrested for other crimes were questioned and their alibis were checked out. No one was ever charged.  Police came to believe that this was the work of a stranger. 

   Her father, Charles Haab, said “I believe this was someone she knew or someone playing at policeman.”

   It was theorized that Susan had been pulled over or forced to pull over in some way.  The assailant’s car was parked in front of hers.  Perhaps he passed her and flashed a badge and then slowed to a stop in front of her. Perhaps he asserted some other type of authority. 

   Reverend Wayne Raynor Meyer, 26, had been Susan’s youth pastor at Seventh Christian Church. He said he had known her since she was in Ninth Grade. In an article in the days following her murder; he mentions that the two of them wrote letters while she was away at Ball State. Did he write to all of his youthful congregation? 

  In the article he says this of Susan: “She was a very honest person and a very sensitive person. She liked to laugh, not just with her face but with her whole body. She seemed like the least likely to have this happen to her.  It was out of character for her”.

  He said when he had first met her that she was sort of the wallflower type but that he had seen her change and gain confidence and poise.

  He said that she was in her happiest time of life. He said she wanted to date and be popular and that it seemed that she was pursuing that. 

  He put forth the theory that this was someone she knew.  He didn’t think she would stop for a stranger. 

  He showed one of her letters to the reporter. 

  Shortly after her murder; Reverend Meyer left Indiana and took a job as a pastor in Pleasanton, Kansas. In June 1969, he married Lynda Lee Adams. She was the same age as Susan.  She also attended Ball State. How did they meet? Was she a friend of Susan’s from Ball State? Their wedding announcement is in the Muncie paper where she was from but not in the Indianapolis paper where he had been living and ministering to his flock.

  She transferred to Kansas State University and finished her degree in Elementary Education in 1970. And then the two of them just drop off the map. 

   Searching for more information about Rev. Wayne R. Meyer and Lynda Lee Meyer after 1970, is nearly impossible. I have found a Wayne R Meyer living in Illinois near Chicago. But, no photos.  You would think a pastor and his teacher wife would be mentioned in the papers associated with baptisms, weddings, Sunday School, Vacation Bible School. Did she work as a teacher anywhere? Did he retire from working? Were either of them honored by their church or work?  Did they have children? I can’t find anything. No birth announcements, divorce information, or death certificates yet. That seems odd to me. Maybe they were just very private people. Maybe they left the country to do missionary work. (They are not listed in the memorial list of names of those dead in the People’s Temple Massacre instigated by Jim Jones who started his ministry in Indiana. I checked.) They did not leave much of an online or paper trail. I can find nothing of Lynda Lee Meyer after 1970 when her graduation announcement was placed in the Muncie paper, likely by her mother. But, maybe they were just very private and humble people. 

   Another suspect in Susan Haab’s murder would come to the public’s attention in 1973. Raymond Charles Lamb would be charged and convicted of the 1973 murder of Kathryn “Kitty” Kaufman.  He was also identified by a shooting victim who survived her attack. Connie Weaver was shot by Raymond Charles Lamb just days before Kathryn Kaufman’s murder. 

   Lamb was suspected in the murder of Carol Ann Rhoades in 1972 and of the 1970 murder of Constance May Thomas.

  We will discuss those attacks and Raymond Charles Lamb in future posts. 

  Susan Beth Haab would be 74 today if she was still alive.  She might have had a long career, traveled, had a family, made a positive impact on her community. She was so driven and so bright. She had graduated high school in only three and a half years and started college at 17.  She was a sophomore and a standout student when she was killed. 

   She had a younger brother named Mark.  He was 15 when she was murdered.  Her parents Charles E. and Beverly J. Haab lived just one minute away from the site of their daughter’s murder. One can only imagine how this tragedy impacted all their lives. It was just after Thanksgiving and just before Christmas. I imagine that they never had another truly joyful and carefree holiday. 

   Their former home came up on Zillow as I was researching this case. It is not for sale but sits empty. The yard is overgrown in the photos. The interior looks unchanged since 1968. It looks long abandoned. The photos tell a tale of an unimaginable loss and a deep grief that was never eased.