How BTK Was Caught: A Floppy Disk and a Church Computer
Between 1974 and 1991, ten people were killed in and around Wichita, Kansas, by a man who called himself “BTK.” He wrote letters to police and local media, then went quiet for years at a time. By the early 2000s the case had gone cold.
The killer starts writing again
In 2004, more than a decade after his last murder, BTK resumed contact, sending new messages to Wichita media and police. In one of them he asked investigators a question: if he sent his messages on a floppy disk, could it be traced to a computer?
Police answered the way he asked them to, through a classified ad in the local newspaper. They told him it would be safe. It wasn’t.
The disk
In February 2005, a floppy disk arrived at KSAS-TV, Wichita’s Fox affiliate. Investigators examined its metadata and found a deleted document that pointed to Christ Lutheran Church, with the last modification made by someone named “Dennis.”
Investigators learned that the president of the church council was Dennis Rader, a Park City compliance officer who had lived in the area throughout the killings.
Confirming it with DNA
To confirm the lead before moving in, investigators obtained a warrant to test a medical sample from a member of Rader’s family. The DNA was a familial match to evidence from the crime scenes.
The arrest
On February 25, 2005, Rader was stopped and arrested while driving near his home in Park City. The next morning Wichita’s police chief announced that BTK had been arrested. On June 27, 2005, Rader pleaded guilty to all ten murders. He was sentenced to ten consecutive life terms.
Remembering the victims
Joseph, Julie, Josephine and Joey Otero; Kathryn Bright; Shirley Vian Relford; Nancy Fox; Marine Hedge; Vicki Wegerle; and Dolores Davis. Each of their stories is on the case page, along with a map of where the case unfolded.