A Murderous Pact Unravels

Small Town Murder episode 51 visits Newport, Oregon, a beach town in Lincoln County on the Pacific coast, about two and a half hours from Portland. It has around 10,260 people, a median age of 43.6, and only 21 per cent of residents are religious. Its early history involved oysters, lumber and fishing, a Fourth of July celebration in 1866 and the Yaquina Bay Bridge, which opened on 3 October 1936 and is 3,200 feet long and 133 feet high. Property crime is almost twice the national average and violent crime is average.

The story is that of Walter Thomas Ackerson Jr., born on 2 July 1973 and raised by his single mother, Karen Hull, in Kettle Falls, Washington. He was a small, sensitive boy who loved animals, but he was bullied. After the family moved to the Puyallup area he skipped school, drank, and was taken to hospital with alcohol poisoning. He did better for a while with his grandmother, Delores, in Tenino, but a spell with his ex-stepfather in Spokane went badly and he returned to his mother. At family counselling they heard about the Job Corps. At 16 Walter chose the centre at Yachats, Oregon, on the coast, and chose culinary arts. On 7 March 1990 he wrote to his grandmother that he was afraid of failing. On 20 March he phoned and said the place was nothing like they thought.

He then fell silent. On 5 April 1990 a counsellor, Bud, phoned Karen and asked about Walter's plans, and she learned he had been missing since 24 March. Another counsellor, Marin Taylor, told her he had gone to Wyoming with another boy. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it The boys said that on 24 March the four went to Nye Beach, got a stranger to buy them beer, and that Walter, very drunk, wandered off. Walter's belongings were handed to Karen without his Ken Griffey Jr rookie cards. Karen and Delores drove down and questioned the three students themselves. They would not look her in the eye. Karen wrote to Congress, but the letters were passed from agency to agency and answered by Casto, the counsellor who had barred her from the site. this part of the story is covered for now The Newport police said bodies from that bridge wash up, and Karen signed a form that classed Walter as a runaway juvenile and ended active inquiry.

Nothing happened for years. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now In March 2004 a discharged marine in Alabama was found with clippings about missing children including Walter, and the name reached Oregon, where detective Mark Meester reopened the file. details of the account remain covered until revealed All told the same story, and after a year Meester sent the file back to the archives.

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now With Prineville police lieutenant Jimmy O'Daniel listening, he said he had beaten Walter to death 20 years earlier. He told detectives that Walter, drunk and complaining, had been hit again and again and thrown against a tree. details of the account remain covered until revealed The three returned to the Job Corps, put the bloody clothes through the laundry with bleach and agreed on their story. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed Walter's body was never found.

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed Karen, then director of the Pierce County Housing Authority, said it was not justice. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it He is held at Snake River Correctional Institution in Ontario, Oregon.