Janice and Brandon Beidleman:1981, Columbus, Ohio
Janice Marie Foster was born March 19th, 1960. I wasn’t able to find much about her early years. Her son, Brandon Lamar Beidleman was born December 19th, 1979.
Janice Foster married Stanley Allen Beidleman on April 9th, 1980. He was a 1977 graduate of Linden McKinley High School. He worked at General Motors. The little family celebrated Brandon’s first birthday and his second Christmas that year. He might have been walking a bit that Christmas of 1980.
In early April, the Beidlemans would have celebrated their first Anniversary. Six months later both Janice and her young son would be dead. Brandon did not even get to celebrate his second birthday.
On September 13th, 1981, Janice and Brandon left a relative’s home near Marcia Drive and Myrtle Avenue on the North side of Columbus, Ohio. Janice was driving her 1974 Chevy Vega and Brandon was safely buckled up in his car seat in the back. She planned to stop at the grocery store on her way home to Beechwold Avenue.
The two, tragically, did not make it home that evening.
21 year old Janice Marie Foster Beidleman was found beaten and strangled to death. She was found floating face down in Alum Creek near Agler and Sunbury.
Her son, Brandon, was found about 50 yards downstream. He was floating face up and was located under a bridge.
Investigators determined that Janice had been attacked and killed there. It wasn’t reported that she was sexually assaulted but we shouldn’t rule that out. It’s a likely motive.
There was no reporting of whether she had already stopped at the store. She may have, though. A likely scenario is that someone carjacked her in the parking lot and forced her to drive her car to the scene of the crime. The Chevrolet Vega was found nearby beneath the Agler Road bridge.
After the initial news stories there isn’t much reported about this cruel double murder of a young mother and her toddler.
In a recent Facebook post, it was reported that Brandon had been suffocated before being thrown into the creek with his mother.
This is similar to the April 1979 murder of Terry Lee Chasteen and her three young children in Mooresville, Indiana. The perpetrator of that crime, Steve Timothy Judy, couldn’t be responsible for the murders of Janice and Brandon.
Who is responsible for this? Ralph Richard Howell was still active in Ohio at the time. He strangled many of his victims with cord used to tie up bundles of newspapers. He delivered bulk newspapers to newsstands and stores all over Ohio. He would have worked at night.
Howell was Caucasian and most killers tend to kill within their own ethnic group. But, not always. I attribute that trend to the fact that it’s easier for killers who lure victims or decieve victims to approach victims who are the same race. But, a killer who is simply abducting a victim, in a dark parking lot, wouldn’t necessarily have to appear innocuous.
Bobbie Lewis Barnett was an African American man abducted a Caucasian woman, Betty Fair Burns, from a parking lot in Indianapolis. He attempted to sexually assault her and murdered her by strangulation in an out of the way pet cemetery. He left her face down in a puddle. Could he have been in Columbus in 1981?
Janice’s husband, Stanley Allen Beidleman, told police that his wife and son had been missing since about 10:30 p.m. Sunday.
Janice and Brandon Beidleman have profiles on Find a Grave. Their burial place is not listed, however. The website says that they were cremated but doesn’t say where the remains are located. (The cremation of the two may be simply assumed. I wasn’t able to find documentation of their funeral arrangements.) Perhaps they are with family. I wasn’t able to find obituary information from 1981.
After the murders of his wife and child, Stanley Allen Beidleman married again on December 27th, 1985. He and his second wife divorced in 1993. He later moved to Texas and married again in 2003 but was again divorced in 2008. It’s common for spouses who have lost a partner or child to murder to have difficulty maintaining relationships. Trauma is very difficult to live with and overcome.
Stanley Allen Beidleman passed away on August 28th, 2024. He went by the nickname “Blue” while he was alive. He had retired from General Motors and moved to Texas. He was a member of the Rare Blood Motorcycle Club. He was only 67 when he passed away.
The murders of Janice and Brandon Beidleman are still unsolved. If you saw something or heard something please consider submitting a tip. Janice was only 21 when someone cruelly took her life. Brandon was just a toddler who never saw his second birthday. They deserve to still be here. We can’t give them back their lives but we can seek Justice for them. There is no statute of limitations on murder.
Rest in peace Janice and Brandon.
We are thinking of you. We will be working on Justice for you.
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