Seven Murders & One Lie

This episode covers the killings of 25 September 1987 in Elkland, a farming town of 1,956 people in Webster County, southwestern Missouri, about 35 minutes from Springfield. The story centres on two dairy farming families related by marriage. Jim Schnick, in his thirties, ran a dairy farm, worked as a volunteer firefighter and had been a Lions Club member. His wife Julie, born Buckner, was 30. They had two children, Jamie, eight, and Mindy, six. Julie's brother Stephen Buckner, known as Steve, was 35 and farmed about six miles away with his wife Janette, known as Jan, who was 36. They had four sons: Kirk, 14, Dennis, eight, Timmy, six, and Michael, two. Julie's parents were Alfred and Jean Buckner.

The Buckners were short of money. Steve had bought around 110 acres, and made a living selling feed and cattle semen, artificially inseminating cows and refilling liquid nitrogen tanks on other farms, so he was often away. Neighbours said much of the work fell on Kirk, a freshman in the agricultural programme at Marshfield High School, who milked more than 40 cows morning and evening, did the shopping and looked after his brothers. The milk was graded C and there were rumours of foreclosure. Kirk had almost drowned in July 1985 and was rescued by his friend Bill Shoemaker.

On the evening of 24 September Kirk borrowed a car jack and was seen doing chores. At about six the next morning Jamie Schnick phoned his grandparents, Alfred and Jean. They found Jim on the kitchen floor with a gunshot wound to the abdomen and lower leg, in a frightened state. Julie was dead in bed with two bullet wounds to the forehead. Kirk lay dead in the living room, shot in the chest, neck and back and stabbed twice, with a .22 revolver in his right hand, although he was left-handed. The two Schnick children were unharmed. At the Buckner home, Michael was dead in a playpen, Timmy and Dennis were shot twice each in their bunk bed, and Jan was dead in the barn. Steve was found shot twice in the head on a gravel road near a cemetery between the farms, apparently dumped from his pickup.

Schnick said Kirk had burst in shooting, and police, led by West Webster County sheriff Eugene Fraker, concluded the boy had snapped. Doubts grew. Schnick's wounds were minor, he asked to stay in hospital, and Fraker recalled him thrashing as though held back from a fight. Kirk weighed about 91 pounds and could not easily have moved his much heavier father. On 1 October Schnick gave a longer interview and agreed to a polygraph. A lab report found evidence in his clothing that he had handled the .22. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it He claimed Steve had raped Julie when they were children and that he had neglected his sons. Julie had a $50,000 insurance policy. Fraker publicly cleared Kirk.

this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed A psychologist, Dr Foster, said he repressed the killings and was unlikely to offend again. 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 A 2000 book, Murder in the Heartland, and a 2016 book, No Justice: The Jim Schnick Story, which argues his innocence, cover the case. Schnick died, aged 73, at South Central Correctional Center in Licking on 11 May 2024. The victims are buried at Timber Ridge cemetery in Marshfield.