Jacob Wetterling's remains may have been found.

September 3, 2016 7:37 AM

Finding Jacob: Authorities recovered unidentified remains this week after Danny Heinrich, a suspect in the disappearance of Jacob Wetterling, agreed to cooperate and provide information, according to authorities.
posted by Autumnheart (30 comments total)

I'm glad that the family is hopefully going to get some closure, but this is really the darkest possible timeline for what happened to Jacob.

It's sad that part of me hopes that he fought back hard enough to enrage his captor(s) into killing him early.
posted by sparklemotion at 7:50 AM on September 3, 2016 [5 favorites]

Heinrich re-emerged as a "person of interest" last summer, authorities have said, because of similarities to the January 1989 kidnapping and sexual assault of the Cold Spring boy.

...

DNA evidence later found on the sweatshirt of the boy, Jared Scheierl, now 39, matched Heinrich. Authorities said in October that Heinrich could not be charged in Scheierl's case because the statute of limitations had run out.

I know it varies by state, but it was my understanding that "heinous crimes," which include kidnapping, typically have no statute of limitations. /not a lawyer
posted by zakur at 8:07 AM on September 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've been following this all morning. Jacob was my age. Every kid in Minnesota remembers when Jacob Wetterling went missing because all of our lives changed. No more walking up to the store alone, no more playing outside after dinner, and all of a sudden every family had a "password" to foil would-be kidnappers.

One reason Jacob's disappearance hit so hard was that his parents became strong advocates for missing and exploited children. It was on the news every night. His mother, Patty, was a politician in the sixth district and then turned to child advocacy. The Jacob Wetterling law was passed in 1994, which created the sex-offender registry in MN. Patty is currently the chair of the Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Because of their advocacy, all of us kids in MN knew who Jacob was and that there were bad people out there. Maybe it was because I was eleven, and that's when childhood kind of ends for a lot of kids. But I very keenly remember hearing about Jacob and realizing that the world was not a safe place and that there were people out there who would do kids harm. I think that innocence ended for a lot of kids around that time.

I used to daydream about finding Jacob when I was a kid. I'd find him hiding under a flight of stairs, or sitting on a high branch of a tall tree. I'd rescue him and take him straight to the police where they would call his parents and everything would go back to normal. I'm glad that they have more answers now than they used to. 27 years is a long time to not know.
posted by Elly Vortex at 8:09 AM on September 3, 2016 [45 favorites]

Like Elly said, Jacob's abduction looms large in the psyche of people who were kids in Minnesota at the time. Surprised myself by bursting into tears at the news this morning.

I wonder how many kids were victimized by this guy, and what could have been prevented if the earlier Cold Spring cases had been less swept under the rug.
posted by superna at 8:22 AM on September 3, 2016 [4 favorites]

If I'm reading it right, MN does not have a statute of limitations[PDF link] for murder, and eliminated it for some other offenses in 2000.
posted by superna at 8:36 AM on September 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

.

Another Minnesota kid. I hope the Wetterlings can find some peace.
posted by Molly Razor at 8:55 AM on September 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

Waiting For Jacob (ABC News, 2009)

.

For Jacob, and many prayers for the other two boys who survived that night.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:08 AM on September 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yes, as an Iowa kid here, now living in Minnesota, I remember the fear around his disappearance. I too felt so shocked and sad when I saw the news today. My heart hurts for his family.
posted by Malla at 9:42 AM on September 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

Curious what effect this will have on APM's Serial-esque podcast on the case, planned to drop later this month.
posted by Flannery Culp at 9:55 AM on September 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

I know it varies by state, but it was my understanding that "heinous crimes," which include kidnapping, typically have no statute of limitations.

Minnesota removed the statute of limitations for kidnapping in 2000. The crime in question took place under the old law.
posted by Lame_username at 11:13 AM on September 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Another MN kid of the same generation, and this definitely made me suck in a breath.

Bless his family for going so long with no answers, only to get such a sad resolution.
posted by wenestvedt at 11:19 AM on September 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

I feel so bad for his family. May they find peace.
posted by Katjusa Roquette at 11:55 AM on September 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

I read a book about this a year or so ago. Such an awful case, how he was just taken and he wasn't even alone when it happened and there weren't even delays in the search and still, so many years with no answers. I can't imagine how it affected everyone locally; I couldn't wrap my head around it as an adult on the other side of the world.

I wish peace for his family and hope the closure helps them, even if it means no chance of him coming back.
posted by kitten magic at 5:10 PM on September 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

We talked about this case around the campfire last night and then we woke up to read this. I was twelve and living in the same county when this happened. I rode past the spot in my school bus for a year. Too many people I have known first or second hand have been suspects and though some were bad people, many were not. It was a real lesson to me about hysteria and mob mentality. I am glad that his family finally gets the closure they deserve after so long.
By the way, it has been confirmed that they are his remains. Our whole state is in mourning all over again.
posted by soelo at 5:17 PM on September 3, 2016 [6 favorites]

I'm in Minnesota now, visiting family, and seem to have been the first to have heard this news, and so have been sharing it, because Minnesotans want to know. The reaction has been the same every time: shocked silence, and then a long discussion about how much things changed after Jacob, and often tears.

This is a story of no small meaning here in Minnesota. I was visiting Boys Town a few years ago and discovered that for some reason they have a little monument to Jacob and just felt like the wind had been sucked out of me, so it has no small meaning for me either.

That poor boy, that poor family. How awful. How unspeakably awful. And I know we want the family to have peace, and at least they now know. But this is another death for the Wetterlings. It is the death of hope. Finding out is better than never finding out, but this is the worst case scenario for finding out, and I just feel so terrible for the Wetterlings.
posted by maxsparber at 9:42 PM on September 3, 2016 [5 favorites]

I am not a native Minnesotan, but have lived here for a bit. One of the things I noticed was how close people monitored their children. The children needed to be kept busy and never alone. I got the impression that it was a bit transgressive to let your children be on their own or even in groups running around the neighborhood. I put this down to the general paranoia of America in the last 20 years. Now, I know the level of impact Jacob's disappearance had on the community psyche.
posted by jadepearl at 5:59 AM on September 4, 2016 [4 favorites]

I've spent almost all my life in Minnesota. I'm 60 years old. After all these years I assumed that, other than his abductor, no one would ever know what happened to Jacob. It was an enormous shock yesterday to hear this news. So very, very sorry for his family.
posted by marsha56 at 1:25 PM on September 4, 2016

Lived in Minnesota for about ten years.

There is part of me that has long understood the extraordinarily small chance that Jacob would be found alive and therefore figures that this is at least better than never knowing, but honestly, I have no idea whether it's better. None at all. I haven't a clue whether his family would rather have lived in uncertainty, and I just admire them so much for the efforts they made to do good things in the world where they could.

This poor family, my God.
posted by Linda_Holmes at 7:24 PM on September 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

Update: Danny Heinrich appeared in federal court today and confessed to kidnapping, molesting, and shooting Jacob.
posted by Flannery Culp at 12:24 PM on September 6, 2016 [1 favorite]

In case it's not obvious from Flannery Culp's comment, the link includes details of the confession. Probably not the full details, but enough to make me wish I had gone with my first instincts and not clicked.

In case you also don't want to click: MPR reports that Heinrich will not be prosecuted for the murder, but is expected to serve 20 years in federal prison on a single child pornography charge. The rest of the charges were dropped as part of the plea deal that got him to tell the truth about Jacob Wetterling.

Heinrich is 53 years old.
posted by sparklemotion at 12:55 PM on September 6, 2016

expected to serve 20 years in federal prison on a single child pornography charge. The rest of the charges were dropped as part of the plea deal that got him to tell the truth about Jacob Wetterling.

I'm glad that the Wetterlings are spared the horror of a trial, but am utterly baffled by the seeming leniency of this plea bargain, considering what a nightmare the entire case was for the state of MN, not to mention Heinrich's relative youth.
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 1:06 PM on September 6, 2016

I'm glad that the Wetterlings are spared the horror of a trial, but am utterly baffled by the seeming leniency of this plea bargain, considering what a nightmare the entire case was for the state of MN, not to mention Heinrich's relative youth.

Would the Wetterlings have needed to agree to the plea deal? I don't know how it works, but I assume they were consulted? It's just so awful and crushing. I sincerely thought knowing would be better, but maybe there is no better. It's a terrible, painful thing no matter what.
posted by Molly Razor at 3:38 PM on September 6, 2016 [1 favorite]

The article has been updated and says that the Wetterlings did sign off on the plea deal. What a choice to have to make.
posted by Flannery Culp at 4:22 PM on September 6, 2016

Even without knowing that the Wetterlings were consulted, my gut reaction was to trust that the prosecutors knew what they were doing.

I'm glad the Wetterlings got to have a say, and Patty, of all people, should be trusted to have a good handle on what the options were.

As I see it, I highly doubt that Hendrich will live through his whole sentence (he's not a healthy looking 53),and even if he's released someday, the life he will live will not be a grand one.

Better to get closure for Jacob, and maybe for more of the kids featured in Hendrich's "photo album. " I would not be surprised at all if the deal involves the sharing of details that can help with other prosecutions. (no need for us to know those kinds of details now)
posted by sparklemotion at 4:40 PM on September 6, 2016 [1 favorite]

This article in USAToday is pretty unnerving for me because the man mentioned in the article was my marching band director for 2 or 3 years in the early nineties. I also have relatives who were taught by him and teach with him today. Teenage gossip was so rampant at the time that I can't believe that he was such a strong suspect and none of us knew. In retrospect, that was a very good thing because we were cruel enough to the staff back then.

The line between witness and suspect is so razor-thin. What a crap place for him be, home alone so close to the crime scene at the time that it happened. I can only imagine the sense of relief this brings him and how many apologies he is getting this week.
posted by soelo at 12:29 PM on September 9, 2016

This article in USAToday...

I'm absolutely unqualified to judge this, but my gut reaction is that I'm very concerned about the way it seems like the investigators used hypnosis evidence here. I'm also not in love with the idea of Patty Wetterling running around with a wire on, but I can't fault her for doing everything she could.

I wasn't going to listen to the APM podcast, but I might if it turns out that they are going to go in depth on this kind of stuff. I'd love to hear more about whether these techniques do more to help than harm.
posted by sparklemotion at 12:52 PM on September 9, 2016

The two episodes of "Light in the Dark" that I've listened to have been very well done so far.
posted by drezdn at 1:11 PM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

That's good to know, thank you -- as an APM fangirl, I'm not surprised to hear that In the Dark is good, I just don't know if I want to be thinking about this particular crime every week.

Somehow, Serial and Making a Murder don't bother me, but that's probably a combination of the victims being adults (just barely in Serial's case, of course) , and the ongoing injustice angle of the possibly flawed convictions.
posted by sparklemotion at 1:24 PM on September 9, 2016

I grew up near the town where Jacob lived and am around his age. Obviously it had an impact on my childhood and I remember the yellow buttons we all had on our school bags, the fear us kids felt, the ways our parents changed their parenting, the two songs that played endlessly on the local radio stations. When I heard the news the other day I felt like I had been punched in the gut and was just stunned. I pulled over to the side of the road and had to sit for awhile before I felt like I could drive again.

Listening to "In The Dark" knowing what we know now is a very different experience than I believe it would have been prior to Jacob's remains being found. I think it will be easier to hear about the ways the police et al. fucked up now that we have resolution. "Easier" might not be right word because it's still hard as hell and I have cried while listening to both episodes but there's something about knowing he's not still being held captive in a basement somewhere that is "easier."
posted by Burn.Don't.Freeze at 1:41 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Probably not the full details, but enough to make me wish I had gone with my first instincts and not clicked.

I've read the full confession, which is both terrible and terribly sad. It was also oddly a relief, as my mind, after decades of watching television shows that present the most terrible, garish murders possible, is capable of imagining this much, much worse. Without going into too much detail, it was surprisingly quotidian, as these things go, and relatively brief, and Jacob seems not to have known he was to be killed and likely did not suffer.

Small comfort, I know, but I suspect the Wetterlings are capable of imaging things as terrible as I can, and perhaps there is some comfort in knowing that the suffering wasn't as bad as it could be.
posted by maxsparber at 2:21 PM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]