In October of 2006, Luke Homan, a student at UW-La Crosse, was found dead in the Mississippi River. He was number eight in a string of college-age deaths in the river within nine years. Yet, serial killer theories had already been circulating around La Crosse for years. Annemarie Conte investigated for Stuff magazine in October 2004 for her article “Mystery River.”

Conte believes that the police did a thorough investigation, but simply did not have enough evidence to believe there was a serial killer. She says that people will always believe firmly on both sides of the theory. Conte says that after awhile, the police grew tired of the theories and shut down.

She explains, “They had done the town hall meetings. They had let people speak their minds. They had tried to refute the evidence. They had talked about this so many times that they finally just gave up and they stopped talking about it.”

Conte understands their fatigue, but believes that when police put up a wall of resistance, they only make the situation worse.

“You’re going to make people believe that you are trying to cover something up. You’re trying to cover up the fact that there was police misconduct or the fact that you’re hiding evidence. And you know the theories will just spiral out of control.”

Even though Jeffrey Dahmer had been dead before the first drowning in the suspicious string of deaths, his presence is still felt. A likely suspect for awhile was John Doe, an unidentified man who had previously walked into a Missouri police department and declared himself the next Dahmer. Perhaps La Crosse is more susceptible to serial killer theories because Dahmer remains in the cultural memory of Wisconsin.

Conte says, “When you have that — you know, when you’re in something, when you’re surrounded by it in that way — it does make it more real, more of a possibility. Whereas in other areas, that might not be the first thought that people have.”

Yet, she doesn’t believe that La Crosse residents are being unreasonable. In her research, she spoke to numerous FBI agents who told her that, “There tend to be more serial killers out there than actually get caught.”

Due to different jurisdictions, police forces, timings of killings and other factors, the dots may never be connected between murders that all stem from one person, she says.

“I do think that there is more going on than people really realize and really do understand and even want to comprehend because I think sometimes it’s horrible stuff.”

To go back to “Are you there, God? It’s me, Jeffrey,” click here.