Jennifer Lee Schmidt:1985, West Lafayette, Indiana
Jennifer Schmidt was born on May 1st, 1966 to Johnarea “Johnni” and Don Schmidt in Beavercreek, Ohio. She grew up there with two brothers.
In 1985 Jennifer Schmidt was a 19 year old electrical engineering major at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. She had completed her freshman year and was taking summer classes to get ahead in her sophomore year. She was an Air Force ROTC scholarship student. She was a serious young person who was described as religious and conservative.
She had an interest in raising awareness about Vietnam P.O.W. and service members who were still M.I.A. She even organized a candlelight vigil on the Purdue campus in April of her freshman year. It was incredibly thoughtful of her to try to raise awareness and lift up Veterans in this way. When most freshmen are just trying to get their bearings and adjusting to college life; Jennifer was organizing campus events.
On August 6th, 1985, Jennifer Schmidt was supposed to meet with one of her professors. It had been a busy summer filled with classes, homework and meetings.
A friend saw her around 4:30-5:00 p.m. walking in her neighborhood. She was walking back from this meeting, it seems, when she was abducted.
When she didn’t return to her apartment as planned her roommate was worried. She reported Jennifer missing.
Young women in the late 1980’s knew they had to watch out for one another. If you went out to a party you went as a group and left as a group. We had rules. Park in a well lit area if you could. Check your back seat before you get into the car. Place your car keys between each finger like claws as you walk alone at night. Carry mace. Wear shoes that you can run in if need be. We were prey. Something was hunting us. We had to be careful.
I’m sure Jennifer knew all these things too. But some of the predators of the 1980’s were extremely tricky and manipulative. I don’t think I heard about Ted Bundy using a phony cast to pretend to be a bit disabled until the late 1990’s. He would have a fake cast on and use crutches and pretend to fumble some things he was trying to carry. A young woman would stop and help him pick things up. Then he would grab her and stuff her in his car.
Police began searching and alerted other law enforcement agencies. Jennifer’s ROTC unit participated in searches. Students, friends and family were also searching the campus and the surrounding neighborhoods. Missing person posters were distributed and posted in stores and other public places. No sign of Jennifer was ever found.
Larry Dewayne Hall is suspected in the disappearance of Jennifer Schmidt. He was an active serial killer in central Indiana at the time. He would approach a victim in an innocuous way, maybe asking for directions or with some other question. He used a chemical soaked rag to instantly incapacitate the victim. He then dragged the victim into his van.
Larry DeWayne Hall was born December 11th,1962 to Robert and Aera Hall. He had a twin brother named Gary. They made their home in the little town of Wabash, Indiana.
Larry’s father, Robert Hall was a grave digger and cemetery caretaker at Falls Cemetery in Wabash, Indiana. That’s southwest of Fort Wayne, Indiana. The family lived in a small house on the cemetery property.
Larry had difficulties from birth and spent a bit of extra time in the hospital as a newborn. He later showed a lack of attachment. This was before doctors knew the importance of skin to skin contact for newborns. In the 1950’s it was thought that simply attending to the medical necessities of a pediatric patient was all they needed. (Ted Kaczynski, known as The Unabomber, also suffered from emotional neglect in a hospital stay as a toddler that left his personality drastically changed, according to his mother. His parents were told not to visit.) Larry Dewayne Hall had difficulty making friends and forming and keeping up relationships in his school days. His brother Gary tried to help him in that area. Gary hoped to be a positive role model. Larry was often upset with Gary and even tried to kill his twin several times.
He found work as a janitor after high school. As a young adult, Larry DeWayne Hall was a Civil War and Revolutionary War Reenactment buff. Traveling the Midwest and other states for reenactment events was his hobby. He was on the road a great deal.
All that traveling means there are potentially many, many victims. It is thought that he began stalking victims and killing in the early 1980’s.
He is a suspect in the murder of 11 year old Linda Lynn Weldy of LaPorte, Indiana in 1987. He was said to be in the area at the time. She was found about two weeks after her abduction. She had been beaten and strangled. She was found face down in a weedy area. Her hands were still clutching clumps of grass.
He is also suspected in the abduction and disappearance of Wendy Louise Felton from her home near Gas City, Indiana in June of 1987. She has never been found.
Tricia Lynn Reitler was a student at Indiana Wesleyan University in Marion, Indiana. She disappeared in March of 1993. Hall is suspected in her disappearance.
Jessica Lynn Roach was from Georgetown, Illinois. It’s a small town near Danville, Illinois. She was found in Perrysville, Indiana in September of 1993.
Evidence connecting Hall to Jessica Roach’s murder was found in his van after he had been pulled over by police. Concerned parents had called police about a suspicious man approaching their children.
Hall eventually confessed to 34 murders of women and young girls. But he has since recanted all of those confessions.
I suspect him in the 1992 murder of Holly Ann Anderson. She lived outside Danville, Illinois in the small town of Catlin. Holly was found January 9th, 1992 just a few farm fields away from where Jessica Roach would be found in the following year.
Hall is serving a life sentence in a Federal Penitentiary in North Carolina for the abduction and murder of Jessica Roach.
If you’re investigating an unsolved murder from this time period. Check the newspapers from the time in your area. Was there a historical reenactment type event, either Civil War or Revolutionary War related, that coincides with the days surrounding the abduction and murder.
Hall lived in Wabash, Indiana but traveled to many states including Pennsylvania, Ohio, Georgia, Alabama, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and possibly others.
Jennifer Schmidt is not the first student abducted from Purdue that I have discussed in this blog.
Kristine Kozik was abducted and murdered in 1977. I have suspected Jeffrey Lynn Hand in her murder.
Another young woman was abducted in 1975 and taken to Minnesota but was rescued. Susan Wells Cochran was abducted by Thomas Ray Lippert. He and an accomplice had hoped to keep her captive and brainwash her into being a willing sex slave. She was rescued and returned to Purdue University. (Lippert spent only a short time in prison.)
In addition to Larry Dewayne Hall; there are other potential suspects.
William Michael Gable was a maintenance man at Purdue University. On Tuesday February 24th, 1987 he kidnapped Merry Lee Evans as she left a stable on the Purdue University Campus. He tied her up and blindfolded her with a knit cap. She was able to see through the cap a bit. Merry made up her mind to observe and remember as much as possible about the man, his 1971 Datsun and the house he took her to.
William Michael Gable took her about 15 miles southeast to the town of Mulberry, Indiana. He chained her to a bed and assaulted her over a 24 hour period. He then tied her up and gagged her with tape and drove to the Wabash River. He dragged her from the car and threw her into the river. Merry managed to free herself from the tape enough and struggled to swim to shore. She sought help at a nearby farmhouse and called the police. They believed her.
She was able to describe William Gable and his car and house. Police drove her past his home at 220 South Willard Street in Mulberry later and she said that it seemed to match.
I imagined a rural home but this place is in the town of Mulberry with neighboring houses all around.
On March 1st, 1987, police knocked on William Michael Gable’s door. As they attempted to enter, they heard a single gunshot. William Michael Gable had shot himself with a .357 Magnum. He died instantly.
Did William Michael Gable also abduct and kill Jennifer Schmidt a year and a half before? It’s quite possible. He does seem to be one of the most likely suspects. But, until Jennifer’s remains are found there is no way to know. Even then, time and the physical conditions in which she is found may not allow for a true solution to this case. Is she in the Wabash River? It’s very possible.
Could Gable have murdered Kristine Kozik in 1977? He would have been around 20 years old then. That’s also possible. I have suspected Jeffrey Lynn Hand in her murder but Gable could also be a potential suspect here.
Jennifer Schmidt was 5’ 6” (Approximately 168cm) and weighed 125 lbs (56.7 kilograms). She had brown hair and brown eyes. She was wearing a white shirt, pink shorts and white flat shoes.
She was last seen at Northwestern Avenue and Grant Street on Tuesday August 6th, 1985 speaking with an acquaintance. It would have still been daytime as the sun would not have set for hours yet in late summer. The weather was hot and humid but clear.
Her family continued the search and the investigation continued but with no leads forthcoming her family requested that she be declared deceased in 1993. Her father, Don passed away in 2014 and her mother “Johnni” followed in 2024.
In May of 2024, a skull was found by hikers in the Wabash River in Warren County, Indiana. It has been determined to be a female skull but has not been linked through DNA to a known missing person yet. I don’t know if that means that they have not yet developed a DNA profile on the skull. The age of the person the skull belonged to and the manner of death were not yet determined. (This would be near Williamsport and Attica, Indiana.) Investigators believed that the skull may have been carried downstream by currents and debris.
In October of 2024, a leg bone was recovered by a fisherman from the Wabash River east of Ross Camp. This is a rural area and the nearest crossroads are County Road 925 West and 75 South. DNA testing has yet to name this victim or determine if the skull found earlier that year is from the same victim. The leg bone was found further upstream than the skull. If the skull had been carried downstream then there’s an outside chance they could be connected.
There are other missing persons who are known to have jumped or been thrown into the river from the Lafayette and West Lafayette area in the more recent years. Let’s stay hopeful that they will all one day be found.
Take a moment to remember Jennifer Schmidt and all the promise that her future held. Let’s hope that her remains are found one day and that they can be returned to her family.
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