"I Will Sign Any Paper": John Joubert's Confession and Death-Row Interview, KETV Special, 1996

Name: "I Will Sign Any Paper": John Joubert's Confession and Death-Row Interview, KETV Special, 1996
Uploaded: 2023-06-30T00:00:00Z
Duration: 55 min 7 s
Description: KETV's hour-long 1996 special on John Joubert, aired in the weeks before his execution, includes audio of his 1984 confession and a death-row interview on his childhood, his fantasies, the death penalty and whether he had changed.

KETV's hour-long 1996 special on John Joubert, aired in the weeks before his execution, includes audio of his 1984 confession and a death-row interview on his childhood, his fantasies, the death penalty and whether he had changed.

Subject: John Joubert
Recorded: about June 24, 1996
Runtime: 55:07

Content warning: The murders of three boys aged 11 to 13, described in detail, including in the killer's own taped confession (abduction, binding, stabbing, a bite mark); references to violent sexual fantasies.

The Interview

In June 1996, as Nebraska prepared to execute John Joubert, Omaha station KETV NewsWatch 7 broadcast an hour-long special, "The Life and Crimes of Killer John Joubert". It retells the 1983 murders of two boys in Sarpy County through KETV's archive news footage and interviews with investigators, witnesses, relatives, teachers and friends. Joubert is heard in two ways: in audio from his taped confession to police after his arrest in January 1984, and in an on-camera interview recorded on death row in the weeks before his execution. In all, his own voice takes up roughly 12 to 15 minutes of the programme. The interviewer is not named on the soundtrack.

Historical Context

On September 18, 1983, 13-year-old Danny Joe Eberle disappeared while delivering newspapers in Bellevue, Nebraska; his body was found three days later. On December 2, 1983, 12-year-old Christopher Walden was abducted on his way to school in Papillion; hunters found his body three days later. Both boys had been stabbed. On January 11, 1984, Barbara Weaver, director of the Aldersgate preschool in Bellevue, reported a young man who had been circling the building and who threatened her; the car was traced to a rental by John Joubert, a 20-year-old airman at Offutt Air Force Base. Rope found in his quarters was consistent with the rope used to bind Eberle, and he confessed to both murders. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to death by a three-judge panel in 1984. Bite-mark evidence then linked him to the August 1982 murder of 11-year-old Richard Stetson in Portland, Maine, where he had grown up; a Maine jury convicted him, and he was sentenced to life in 1990. He was executed in the electric chair at the Nebraska State Penitentiary in Lincoln on July 17, 1996.

Circumstances of the Interview

The special was made in what was then expected to be Joubert's last week: the narration says, "This may be his final week," and the closing line expects the execution "this Friday", which fits the date then set, Friday, June 28, 1996. A US Supreme Court stay postponed it. In the interview Joubert says he began working with a psychologist in February 1995 and had been doing so "for 16 months", and that he had been alive "almost 33 years", which places the interview in about June 1996. His former band teacher and friend, Rich Pitre, says he had urged Joubert to talk about his family history; Joubert says his mother had recently told him of violence at home in his early childhood. His Irish correspondent, Teresa O'Brien, had travelled to Nebraska for what were expected to be his final days. How KETV obtained the 1984 confession tapes is not stated.

What the Interview Covers

On the confession tape Joubert describes, in the first person, seeing Danny Joe Eberle while stopped at a store on Mission Street, seizing him, driving him to a dirt road and stabbing him, and later abducting Christopher Walden at knifepoint; former Bellevue assistant police chief Don Carlson, one of the three officers who questioned him, says the confession took them by surprise, and an investigator (probably Carlson) says "everything matched" the evidence. In the 1996 interview Joubert speaks about learning of his parents' violent arguments, being taunted at school and in prison, and says, "I killed Richard Stetson in Portland." He apologises, argues that the death penalty is unfairly applied and does not deter, and says he never thought about getting caught. Asked whether he is reformed, he says he could never harm anyone again, because he can now empathise and is disgusted by what he did, while accepting that he will never be trusted or released. He describes violent fantasies that used the murders as material, says he was not confusing violence and sex, and says he struggled to stop the fantasies in prison until he began therapy. He offers to "sign any paper" that would keep him in prison for life. Relatives of the victims say there is nothing he could tell them that would help, and one says they do not believe his apologies are "totally sincere".

What Makes the Recording Significant

The programme brings together, in one hour, Joubert's own account of two murders as he gave it to police in 1984 and his reflections on them twelve years later, shortly before his execution. It also preserves the voices of the witnesses whose reports led to the composite sketch and his arrest, and of the families and investigators, at the moment the case was closing.

Archival Importance

Recorded interviews with Joubert are few. Robert Ressler interviewed him for an FBI study of murderers, and Omaha television journalist Mark Pettit, a former KMTV anchor, interviewed him on death row in 1987. This special preserves both police confession audio and a death-row interview from his final weeks, uploaded by the station that made it, which describes the upload as the full documentary. It cannot be confirmed whether this was his last recorded interview.

Important Caveats

Joubert's statements about his childhood, his reform, his fantasies and his therapy are his own claims. What his mother told him about his early childhood is reported by him and was not independently confirmed in the programme. The confession audio is poor in places and parts of it are not yet reliably transcribed. The closing narration says he "will die in the electric chair this Friday"; that was the date then set (Friday, June 28, 1996), but a US Supreme Court stay postponed it and he was executed in the early hours of Wednesday, July 17, 1996. The 1984 confession and the 1996 interview appear in edited excerpts; neither is complete.

Ketv Interviewer: Do you know why you killed [unclear: "his boys" / probably "these boys"]?

John Joubert: I do now.

John Colterman: I saw a young boy, only in his briefs. He was tied up, had tape all over him, [unclear: "facial"]. He was [unclear: "morally" / probably "mortally"] wounded, I could see.

Police Chief: I don't know, I guess I'm boiling a little bit inside.

Unidentified Speaker: I know what you feel.

Christopher Walden'S Parent: Someone does have him, we'd like to have him returned safely, please.

John Joubert: I hate what I did, I'm disgusted with what I did.

News Anchor: Christopher Walden's body was found at dusk last night.

John Joubert: I committed the murder, sir.

News Reporter: John J. Joubert, 20, an airman from Offutt Air Force Base, was arrested tonight.

John Joubert: I'm not even going to try to justify it.

Unidentified Speaker: I thought it was in his best interest to plead guilty.

John Joubert: John Joubert is more than someone who has murdered three children.

News Reporter: Joubert faces Nebraska's electric chair.

Victim'S Relative: And John, I hope you're watching this, because your time's up.

John Joubert: It shouldn't have happened.

Carol Kloss: Good evening, I'm Carol Kloss. It was just before dawn, Sunday, September 18th, 1983. Most people here in the town of Bellevue, Nebraska, were still sound asleep. But something horrible was about to happen that would shatter the innocence of this community and change the lives of people here forever. It was a place where newspaper boys didn't think twice about heading out on their bikes alone. 13-year-old Danny Joe Eberle was one of those boys.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: This little boy had energy that I've never seen anybody else in my whole entire life. He was very responsible. All his paper route money had gone to, like, saving for the bike that he got.

Narrator: That Sunday morning, Danny Joe Eberle arrived at the Dairy Queen parking lot to begin his paper route. It was the last time his World-Herald supervisor would see him alive. The supervisor told Bellevue police he met Danny here behind the Dairy Queen and gave him approximately 70 newspapers plus the Sunday morning inserts. Bellevue police estimate that Danny probably spent between 10 and 15 minutes putting those inserts inside the Sunday papers, and then he left on his deliveries. Riding his bicycle, Danny then traveled south here along Madison Avenue. He made it as far as 23rd Avenue, the corner. From there, he made only three deliveries. His last stop was here at (house number withheld) Madison, the home of Dr. Joe Troyer.

Dr. Joe Troyer: As I looked at the screen door, I saw his bike with the papers on the handlebars, and the bike was leaning up against the fence right next to the gate.

Narrator: Nearly 13 years later, Dr. Troyer remembers going to church that morning, but when he returned, Danny Joe's bike was still there.

Dr. Joe Troyer: That was leaning up against the fence with all the papers in it. He had his papers in his paper bag, and we didn't know where he was. So I told my son, (son, name withheld), I said, "(name withheld), why don't you get the bike and put it inside the fence."

Unidentified Speaker: He's very attached to his bicycle, [unclear: "with the abandoned"], and this is something that the family stress, that he really was in love with his bicycle. It was something that he wouldn't give up too easily.

Dr. Joe Troyer: And so about 8:15, why, his father came to the door, and he says, "Doc," he says, "have you seen my son?" I said, "No, Leonard," I says, "I didn't see him. I know that his bike was outside there, the fence, and I brought it in." I said, "You know, I think you better go down to the police department."

Narrator: Police suspected Leonard Eberle's son had been kidnapped. They called in the FBI.

Investigator: On Sunday morning, I got a call. I was coaching Little League football in West Omaha, and I got a call from Bellevue police that Danny Joe was missing.

Narrator: Omaha's FBI agent in charge, John Evans, and Sarpy County Sheriff Pat Thomas immediately joined the investigation.

Investigator: The first job we had to do was hunt for Danny Joe, and while that's going on, hunting up all his friends and making sure that he wasn't with them, no relative, haunts that he had. We checked all those out, and that was all done within the first 15 hours. Worked through the night that first night, and we pretty well knew that he had been abducted.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: Me and a couple of friends and I went through fields and in the [unclear: "Deli"] area, Haworth Park, and looking for him, because we knew something was up, because, like I said, he was responsible. He didn't just blow off paper routes to go play with friends or something.

News Reporter: Have you seen Danny Joe Eberle? Two and a half days since the 13-year-old paper boy was last seen, there is still no satisfactory answer to that question.

Narrator: Danny Joe's picture was plastered on telephone poles and TV. Tips poured into Bellevue Crimestoppers.

Unidentified Speaker: This boy is a, from what we know about him, is a real fighter. If someone would have him, and I'm not saying [unclear: "I do" / probably "they do"] have him, he will do everything he can to get away.

Narrator: But the community feared the worst. On Wednesday, three days after Danny Joe Eberle had disappeared, authorities organized a search.

Search Participant: Two or three hundred people, and it was a real massive search, and had all these people there, and the FBI and Bellevue, military, surrounding officers. So we really had a small army, I'd say.

John Colterman: We had officers from all over eastern Nebraska come here. They told us to come out and take [unclear: "Platte Road"] from the river and walk [unclear: "western"].

Narrator: Wahoo Police Chief John Colterman joined the search. He wondered how he'd ever find anything among the trees and tall grass, but less than a half hour into the search, he did.

John Colterman: We got to this area here, down the ditch, close to the ditch, and [unclear: "one day he was out further"], kind of walked through the water. The sheriff was on the other side of the road, walking, looking, and all of a sudden I just had to look down, and I just said, "Here he is." I saw a young boy, only in his briefs. He was tied up, had tape all over him, [unclear: "facial"]. He was [unclear: "morally" / probably "mortally"] wounded, I could see, and at that point in time I walked back out on the road.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: Wednesday morning I was in foods class, and they just asked me to go to the office, and they told me to go get the car and go get the kids and go downtown to the police station. You know, you're thinking, well, if it was something good, they would have said, "We found your brother," you know. They didn't say anything. And then we walked into the police station, and it's like all these solemn faces and, you know, I mean, just hanging their heads down, shaking their heads like, oh, and [unclear: "he" / possibly "you"] just knew it.

Police Chief: Okay, just a few minutes ago I took the father of Danny Joe Eberle to the morgue to identify him. The father identified that the young man was his son. I don't know, I guess I'm boiling a little bit inside.

News Reporter: What's the most disturbing part, Chief?

Police Chief: Well, I guess the condition of Danny Joe when I found him.

Narrator: Danny Joe was wearing only a pair of black underwear shorts. He'd been stabbed many times. His throat slashed. Perhaps most disturbing were the teeth marks found on his body.

Investigator: It's just so hard to imagine somebody doing that to a little boy. [unclear: "It's going to be in another world."] But someone that does that to a little boy, we felt, [unclear: "was unanimous"], he'd do it again.

News Reporter: Flags flying at half staff, usually reserved for high government officials, the military and presidents, this time for a 13-year-old newspaper delivery boy. The murder of Danny Joe Eberle has tragically touched a deep chord in Bellevue.

Bellevue Resident: I'm glad they found [unclear: "you" / probably "him"].

News Reporter: Why's that?

Bellevue Resident: Well, it's a relief to the family. I think if they find the people that do it, they ought to [unclear: "fit up the justice"] as quick as possible.

Student: I knew him at school and stuff. He was a really nice kid and everything.

Narrator: A young boy was dead. And somewhere in Bellevue, a murderer was loose.

Bellevue Resident: It frightens me. I have a 10-year-old son.

Narrator: As fear grew, so did resources dedicated to the case: 150 investigators, 59 FBI offices around the world, and a reward fund of more than $23,000. Hundreds of leads poured in each day. Most of them went nowhere.

Investigator: Yeah, we had people that saw a green van, they thought, in this area. We thought we'd maybe have a dozen or so green vans. The Sarpy County tag, we had over 2,000 green vans on the Sarpy County tag. We checked every single one of them.

Narrator: Lawmen had essentially one good clue: the rope used to tie Danny Joe Eberle's hands and feet.

Investigator: It was a rope that had several plastic fibers that were of different color inside the rope. Green, red, yellow, white, as I recall. They searched and searched and searched and couldn't find a match for it anyplace, couldn't find a location where it was made, which was making the rope more and more unique, which meant if we ever found a piece like it, it would be an extremely strong piece of evidence.

Narrator: But for now, no rope, few clues, and anxiety was growing. Police cruisers patrolled outside schools. And the sheriff feared the killer would strike again.

Narrator: It was a frigid morning, Friday, December 2nd. 11 weeks had passed since Danny Joe Eberle had been killed. 12-year-old Christopher Paul Walden was on his way to Pawnee Elementary School. The only child of Steven and Sue Walden, Chris's mom often drove him, but the sun seemed to warm that cold winter day. So Chris walked, and crossed paths with a murderer.

Investigator: He spotted Christopher Paul Walden walking along. So he pulled over [unclear: "on each side of"] the intersection and got out, across this 48th Street here, and walked up behind him and put a knife [unclear: "through" / probably "to"] his throat and took him over to his car and put him in the car.

Narrator: Cheryl Baumgardner passed by on her way to work.

Cheryl Baumgardner: Well, at first I thought maybe it was a kid not doing what his parent wanted, and then I thought maybe it was a lover's quarrel. I mean, I really didn't think it was anything violent. I just, you know, really didn't think, I guess. I wish I would have done something about it. I regretted that the whole weekend.

Narrator: Cheryl Baumgardner had just witnessed another abduction.

News Reporter: One thing authorities did confirm today, they definitely do not consider Christopher Walden a runaway. Judging by the number of officers now working on the case, nearly 100, that would certainly seem the case.

Narrator: Desperate to find their son, Christopher Walden's parents appealed for help.

Christopher Walden'S Parent: Very concerned about his whereabouts. Someone does have him. We'd like to have him returned safely, please.

Narrator: But their plea proved futile. Three days after their son's disappearance, a pheasant hunter made the gruesome discovery.

News Anchor: Christopher Walden's body was found at dusk last night in a remote area near 108th and Giles, west of Papillion. He had apparently been stabbed to death, just like Danny Joe Eberle in Bellevue last September.

Investigator: Well, the body was lying there frozen, [unclear: "in"] his books and his knapsack and all his belongings were stacked there.

Cheryl Baumgardner: That Sunday night, when they came to tell me that they found his body, that was just agonizing, because I felt that was my fault. I mean, I thought if I could have found that car before Sunday night, this little boy would be okay. And I mean, it was horrible. And I mean, I talked to my priest, and he said, "Don't you think the mother felt bad that she let him walk to school that day, and the teacher felt bad that she didn't report? It's nobody's responsibility except the person that committed the crime."

Narrator: Investigators now realized they were looking for a serial killer. But who could so brutally murder an innocent boy?

Unidentified Speaker: So if you imagine someone making you take your clothes off, with just your shorts on, and walking in the snow, and then making you lie down in the snow, and knowing that you're going to be killed, just unbearable, unbelievable. [unclear: "I mean, how you could make that nice."] You know, he's got the knife pointed at you, you know, held at your throat, and there's nowhere to go. He's overpowering you. It would have to be a terrible, terrible feeling for a little boy to go through.

Law-Enforcement Spokesman: White male, 18 to 25 years old, 5 foot 8 inches, 160 pounds. Dark hair, brown eyes, olive skin.

Narrator: This is the face of a killer, a sketch made with the help of witnesses who'd seen Walden's abductor. Finally, lawmen had something to go on.

Law-Enforcement Spokesman: Leads are coming forth now [unclear: "before"] possible contacts were made with other children in the area by a person that might have resembled a sketch that we gave yesterday.

Narrator: Investigators' adrenaline raced while community panic grew.

Parent: It's very scary. I'm, you know, very concerned, you know, so nothing happens, you know, to my children.

Narrator: Police urge children to travel in groups. Many parents wouldn't let their kids out of their sight.

Parent: If they can get a child out here on our busiest street, at a time when there are lots of people around, they can get them anywhere, and I'd just rather be safe than sorry.

Resident: I sent my daughter to my parents in Des Moines for that next week afterwards, because it was so, I mean, the whole city was terrorized, but this area particularly, because, I mean, this is our corner. You know, this is, you know, not even our neighborhood, our corner, right here. And it was really scary, and not knowing who this person was, or where they were.

Narrator: Children at Pawnee School had more than just fear to deal with. They had lost a classmate. Special counselors helped them cope with their grief.

School Staff Member: To think, gee, if only I would have done something different, but there isn't any way we could have done it.

Narrator: Anxiety and grief were compounded by the fact that the murderer could be anywhere.

News Reporter: All week long, investigators have contended they're hot on the killer's trail, but still no suspect has been apprehended. So many questions remain unanswered as to the whereabouts of the suspect and the type of vehicle he drove, and whether or not investigators know the answers, they're unwilling to say.

Narrator: Sheriff Thomas issued a challenge.

Pat Thomas: And I think that the individual who's responsible for these acts is very sick, spineless, a coward, and I would urge him to call a minister, or a priest, or me.

Barbara Weaver: [unclear: "Now 5154"], I'll never forget it.

Narrator: January 11, 1984, five weeks since the last murder, suddenly a major break in the case. The director of Aldersgate Methodist Church Preschool was getting ready for children to arrive. Barbara Weaver was alone in the basement when she noticed a car circling outside. To this day, she's too scared to show her face, but she remembers exactly what happened.

Barbara Weaver: I went over to the door and stood and waited, because I expected him to come back around, and within another 30 seconds or two, a minute, he did come back around again. And at that time he pulled up head on. So he was sitting there looking into the window directly at me, and I was at the door. There was a window right next to the door, and I was standing there looking at him. And at that time I was trying to memorize the license number. And after watching me for a while, he got out of the car and came to the door.

Narrator: Instinctively, Barbara Weaver knew this was the man police were looking for.

Barbara Weaver: He was very young. I was trying to memorize all that I could about his features. He wasn't much bigger than I was, and he didn't appear to be any more than 18 or 19 years old to me. But I remember he had the prettiest eyes, and he just seemed to be, he was real frustrated. His voice was trembling. It almost appeared as if he were going to cry. He had a real broken spirit about him. The door was unlocked, so I knew I needed to be at the door so I could get out if I needed to. And so I opened the door and asked if I could help him. At that point he asked for directions to a certain street. And I was trying to give him directions. And after the directions he just shook his head in frustration, like he didn't understand what I was telling him. And he asked if there were a phone there that he could use, and I said no, there was not a phone. And at that point he, he pushed me and said, "Get into the building or I'm going to kill you." And with all my might I just pushed him and ran past him and ran down the street to the pastor's house. He ran one direction, [unclear: "he ran" / probably "I ran"] the other, and that...

Investigator: And these, in these serial killers, they, the big thing in their, in their procedure is control, and you've got to break that concentration of control. Mrs. Weaver did that.

Narrator: Within minutes, authorities had a make on the suspect's car: a Chevy Citation from Beardmore Chevrolet, rented to a 20-year-old airman. His name: John Joubert. Authorities went to his barracks at Offutt Air Force Base. They found him asleep in his bunk. Inside his duffel bag, a piece of the rope with the multicolored strands.

News Reporter: John J. Joubert, that's J-O-U-B-E-R-T, 20, an airman from Offutt Air Force Base, was arrested tonight by the task force in connection with the Eberle-Walden homicides.

Narrator: The search had ended.

Narrator: John Joseph Joubert IV, born July 2nd, 1963, in Lawrence, Massachusetts, the only son of Beverly and Jack Joubert. Jack ran the local diner. When John was eight years old, his parents divorced. A few years later he moved with his mother and younger sister Jane to Portland, Maine. Here in this New England coastal town, John Joubert grew up.

Rich Pitre: I think he grew up in a, you know, very difficult home. You know, with not only the parents divorced, but a history of mental illness in the family.

Narrator: For a long time, Joubert refused to talk about his childhood, but with coaxing from his friend Rich Pitre, Joubert is opening up. Pitre was Joubert's band teacher in high school. Coincidentally, Pitre was studying at Creighton University in Omaha the year Joubert was arrested. Through the years, he's become Joubert's close friend and spiritual counselor.

Rich Pitre: And he has always adamantly refused. Nothing is to be said about his family, but nothing negative, nothing, period, because he wants to protect them at all costs. And I've been saying for years, you know, "But really, you didn't get where you are out of the blue, nowhere. There's a history here, and people should know about the history." And I said, "Look, your life is on the line here, right? Some people's feelings may be hurt and so on, but the fact is, by the way, they'll get over it. You aren't going to get over the electric chair."

Narrator: Now on death row, John Joubert's mother recently visited him and shared some deep, dark family secrets.

John Joubert: I don't remember any of this, but I have been told that my family life as a child was in turmoil. There were several loud arguments. My father would come home drunk. He would be abusive towards my mother. And at one point, just two months ago, my mother told me that I witnessed my father choking her until she passed out. I would have been standing in the hallway by my bedroom, and this took place in the hall. This is all buried. I don't have any memory of this. It's all, it's all, it's all new.

Narrator: Many of his childhood memories seem to be lost. Pitre says as a young boy, Joubert was starved for affection from a father who wasn't around.

Rich Pitre: When John was 14, he hadn't seen his dad in quite a while, and he really wanted to see him. I guess the dad was not coming to visit, and the mom wasn't taking him to see his dad. So he kept saying, "I wanted to see my dad." So she basically said, as I understand it, "So go." So he got on his bike and rode, it took him two days, rode 108 miles to where his dad was, to visit his father. Stayed in some trailer on the way overnight. But, you know, obviously there was a huge need on his part for some sort of contact with his father, you know, for him to take that sort of, at that age, you know, this trip.

Narrator: At home, Pitre says, Joubert was suppressed by a demanding and overbearing mother.

Rich Pitre: He's never talked about physical abuse. My impression is that the mother was cold and extremely manipulative. And this I do know from his being a student here: overly controlling, imposing things. You know, I think that, you know, kids that age should be able to do for themselves and decide for themselves or whatever. You know, he was under a very, very tight leash.

Narrator: Joubert's mother was determined that her son get a good Catholic education. So his freshman year, he enrolled here at Portland's only all-male Catholic high school, Cheverus High.

Francesca Bergan: He was a very good student in my class. He was an honor student.

Narrator: Joubert's high school Spanish teacher, Francesca Bergan, remembers him as a timid yet respectful young man. He was on the track team, a model Boy Scout, earning the highest rank of Eagle. He played clarinet in the high school band under the direction of Rich Pitre. But class president Jim Champy says he doesn't remember much about John Joubert.

Jim Champy: For the most part, but he was pretty transparent. Kind of just kept to himself. Pretty, very quiet, very shy.

Teacher: Well, he was a little boy all through his high school years. And he seemed to be picked on. And, you know, a lot of kids are picked on, but they seem to defend themselves. And I think because John did not defend himself... I don't know. Sometimes I wonder if he thought he deserved that kind of abuse that he would get. The shoving, you know, the names, the teasing.

John Joubert: And I just sat there with a straight face, ignoring everything.

Ketv Interviewer: That's got to build up some anger.

John Joubert: It does. Now, I tell people about it. It, I mean, the same thing, that there's a parallel today. I mean, I cross the yard for visits and I get the same taunting and teasing kind of thing. I talk about it, and there is no anger.

Narrator: Joubert graduated in 1981. Ironically, under his senior picture, he wrote, "Life is a highway with many roads branching off. Don't get lost." The next year, Joubert enrolled at Norwich University in Vermont. Free from his mother's rule, he let loose, skipped classes, and flunked out his freshman year.

Rich Pitre: He came back after his freshman year at Norwich, and we all said there's something different about John. Nobody could put their finger on it.

Narrator: It was that summer, 1982, Joubert's most serious problems began.

John Joubert: [unclear: "I've made the matters."] I killed Richard Stetson in Portland.

Narrator: Danny Joe Eberle and Christopher Walden were two of John Joubert's victims. There was another. In August of 1982, just about a year before Joubert moved to Nebraska, he found his first murder victim along this jogging trail in Portland, Maine. It was the evening of August 22, 1982. Eleven-year-old Richard Stetson was running around this cove.

Unidentified Speaker: At about the one-mile mark is when people started seeing him with a person a little bit older than him, a young man on a bicycle.

Narrator: John Joubert bicycles alongside the boy until they reach this area on the other side of the cove.

Unidentified Speaker: Over there by the factory is about where the crime scene was. His body was found the [unclear: "next bonding" / probably "next morning"] by a lady that was going to work. She saw, noticed his body, and she called the police.

Narrator: Donald Stetson was 15 years old when his brother was killed. He's still haunted by the image of Richard's brutal murder.

Donald Stetson: He was strangled, he was [unclear: "knight"], and John took a bite out of his left calf, and dental experts from the state of Nebraska and the state of Maine took impressions, and they matched John's teeth.

Narrator: For a year and a half, the Richard Stetson murder went unsolved. John Joubert joined the Air Force. Only after he confessed to killing two more boys in Nebraska would lawmen in Maine make the connection. January 11th, 1984: John Joubert, Offutt airman, became John Joubert, accused child killer. Hours after he'd been arrested for accosting Barbara Weaver at Aldersgate Preschool, Joubert confessed to the murders of Danny Joe Eberle and Christopher Walden.

Interviewing Officer: What we'd like to do is to start with the first homicide that occurred.

Narrator: Bellevue's former assistant police chief Don Carlson was one of the three officers who interviewed Joubert.

Don Carlson: And all of a sudden he just starts talking about it. None of us expected that. It caught the three of us totally by surprise.

Narrator: Carlson had been part of the investigation since day one, and it was clear Joubert knew intimate details of Danny Joe Eberle's abduction.

John Joubert: I pulled up at the [unclear: "quick start" / possibly "Quik Stop" or "Quick Shop"] on Mission Street to get something to drink. As I was drinking, I was drinking it outside, and [unclear: "he" / possibly "I"] was in the car. As I was doing that, I noticed this kid, uh, [unclear: "looking at his face for the day"].

Narrator: Joubert said he drove down Madison Street and parked. He got out of his car and started walking toward Danny Joe.

John Joubert: When he turned his back on me to get on his bike, I grabbed him, put my hand over his mouth, and then [unclear: "my face fell out and he kind of did something in his tent"]. He came with me, and he didn't struggle at that time. He just came with me.

Narrator: The rope he used to tie up Danny Joe Eberle had come from Joubert's Boy Scout leader. It was to be used on Boy Scout campouts.

John Joubert: I got in my car and drove on past the base lake, past [unclear: "base"], down to the corner of that road, and [unclear: "I don't want to show it to me"]. [unclear: "He" / probably "I"] turned left onto the dirt road, approximately 100 feet. [unclear: "He started to shut it off."]

Narrator: Joubert pulled Danny Joe out of the trunk and carried him to a ditch. He had Danny Joe take off all his clothes except a pair of underwear.

Don Carlson: One of the ironic things on Danny's death was he had a black pair of undershorts on, and of course he knew that. We asked him that. Chuck asked him if he knew what color his shorts were, and he told us.

John Joubert: Then I pulled out the knife. [unclear: "said" / possibly "He said"], "No, please don't [unclear: "change it"]." [unclear: "I" / possibly "He"] struggled a little bit then, and I stabbed him in the back. And when I had done that, he told me that if I would take him to the hospital, he wouldn't say anything. I didn't believe him, and I stabbed him again a couple of times.

Interviewing Officer: [unclear: "The problem in the back?"]

John Joubert: [unclear: "No, I didn't. I like to remember standing in the back, when I made a standing in front, I can't remember."] I also sliced the back of his neck. He wasn't moving, but I wasn't sure that he was dead or not, so I sliced his [unclear: "leg"]. [unclear: "He didn't kind of scare dead, so I just took night, got the time, and put it on."]

Narrator: Joubert said he went back to his barracks and went to sleep. Later that night, he would attend a [unclear: "voice-out" / probably "Boy Scout"] meeting. For more than two months after Danny Joe's murder, John Joubert went about his business at Offutt Air Force Base. No one ever suspected the shy young airman of doing anything wrong. But by December, Joubert's urge to kill was back.

John Joubert: That morning, December 2nd, would have been a Saturday morning. [unclear: "That's the one, same thing."]

Interviewing Officer: [unclear: "It was, was that an attack?"]

Narrator: Joubert said he brought with him the same knife he had used on Danny Joe. This time, he spotted Christopher Walden walking toward Pawnee Elementary School. Once again, he parked and got out of his car.

John Joubert: I walked up to him, and [unclear: "he showed him my knife"], and I said, [unclear: "I'm going to find it out here."] [unclear: "He said, I'm going to show it to him, and I said,"] and he walked over to [unclear: "his" / probably "my"] car.

Narrator: Joubert made Chris get down on the floor. The boy was crying. Joubert started driving. At first, he got lost, and for a moment considered letting the boy go. Finally, he found his way to Cornhusker Road. [31:47 to 32:00: no text in the machine transcript.]

John Joubert: [unclear: "It started wrapping down with that blank rib as you knew it. It turned into a rib. And that's the little edge."] And I told him that [unclear: "this bag would stop here"]. And he did everything I told him to do. Nothing would happen to him. And I told him to take [unclear: "back"] the clothes. He did. He took the clothes [unclear: "down"]. [unclear: "He was pregnant. And I thought he was pregnant."] All of his clothes, except for his [unclear: "entrance"]. [unclear: "The clothes just lay down in his back."] [unclear: "And if one night I heard nothing, his chest would start spinning."] He was struggling. It looked like he was in pain. I didn't want to see him suffering. [unclear: "He left his car. He took out a gun. He stabbed him. He stabbed him in the back of everything."] And then I sliced [unclear: "his car"]. And it looked like he was dead. [unclear: "He sliced" / possibly "I sliced"] his stomach. Just to make sure.

Don Carlson: From the evidence that we had and when he confessed to us, everything matched.

Narrator: With both confessions on tape, John Joubert was charged with two counts of murder.

Narrator: A quiet, polite man with a boyish face, not the typical image of a serial killer. Even with John Joubert behind bars, many people weren't ready to let down their guard.

Resident: John Joubert changed the way we live our lives. This was a nightmare for me, and I'm always going to watch [unclear: "him" / probably "them"] closer. I'll let it down a little bit, you know, but not never like I was before. I think it's going to stick with me forever. You never know who's walking the streets anymore.

Narrator: Parents still picked their kids up from school, and kids still found safety in numbers.

News Reporter: Will you feel safe playing out in the streets now?

Child: No, no, not that safe.

Narrator: Omaha school policy on notifying parents of children's absence changed forever.

School Official: And we're going to continue to ask the parents to call us if their children are absent from school, to let us know if they are ill. If we don't get a call, we will call the home.

Narrator: People were no longer so trusting. If a Boy Scout leader could harm children the way Joubert had, who could you trust?

Donald Shipman: The boys were close to him, they enjoyed his company, they enjoyed being with him, and they're just as confused as I am.

Narrator: Scoutmaster Donald Shipman was shocked by Joubert's arrest. As his assistant scout leader, Joubert had gone on campouts with the troop.

Donald Shipman: I've been very introspective, trying to see that if this young man that I am acquainted with is capable of committing those crimes, and I cannot reach a decision.

News Reporter: Joubert worked in this building. His co-workers said he was just an average sort of person and expressed shock and dismay at his arrest.

Narrator: In this maintenance shop at Offutt Air Force Base, Joubert had worked side by side with 50 other airmen. Ironically, the composite picture of the killer had been posted on this bulletin board. No one had suspected Joubert for a moment. His former high school classmates in Portland, Maine, were in total disbelief.

Former Classmate: I don't know. I never saw him get physical. [unclear: "I always seem to be too smart. I shined just to be physical with anybody."] Everybody was always bigger than him.

Narrator: As time went on, it became clear John Joubert, Boy Scout leader, Offutt airman and model student, was the man responsible for these atrocious acts. Single-handedly, he'd held an entire community hostage. But with the killer finally behind bars, people began to feel a sense of relief. As for the victims' families, they too felt relief, but not much satisfaction.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: Oh, relief, definitely. Relief, but then it's like there's nothing that's going to bring Danny back. So, you know what I mean? It's like it wasn't happy. It was just like, I'm good, at least he won't do it to anybody else.

Narrator: John Joubert never faced trial in Sarpy County. In July of 1984, he pleaded guilty to two counts of murder. In October of that year, he was sentenced to death. Joubert did face trial in Portland, Maine. There, he was convicted of murder and sentenced to the maximum of life in prison. He was later returned to Nebraska, where he now awaits the electric chair.

John Joubert: Again, I can't do anything except apologize. [unclear: "Oh, and I am sorry."] And it shouldn't have happened.

Narrator: John Joubert has spent the last 12 years on death row. This may be his final week.

Unidentified Speakers: [unclear: "John Joubert's dead on Friday. They said he's a dead man."] We'll pray for you. Don't pray for me. I pray for the children [unclear: "and children"].

Narrator: To this day, most people in Nebraska believe Joubert deserves to die. But what about the victims' families? How do they feel?

Victim'S Relative: I'm glad, in a way, that the state of Nebraska caught him before the state of Maine did, because Nebraska does have capital punishment. The state of Maine doesn't. And I'm going to feel a lot better after this guy is executed. And John, I hope you're watching this, because your time's up.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: I don't want him out, and I don't want him to sit there and get four degrees in college and just have this happy life. [unclear: "them"]. I don't know. I don't know.

Ketv Interviewer: But on the other hand, you don't necessarily want him dead.

Danny Joe Eberle'S Sibling: I can't. I don't know. I can't answer that, because I mean, I just don't think, like I said, if it was going to bring Danny back, you bet. You know, if I get to see my brother and give him a big hug, yeah. But, you know, he's not going to be back. I mean, he took him away, and there's no really good feeling about it. I mean, death is death for anybody, you know.

Narrator: As for Joubert himself?

John Joubert: I don't think anyone deserves to die. The death penalty is not being administered fairly. And it doesn't deter anybody. I mean, look at the Otey execution. They killed Harold Otey in 1994, and you could go through your own file tapes, and you probably know better than I do how many murders there have been just since then. Do you really think any of those people said, "Well, wait a minute, they killed Otey. I better not kill this person, or they might do the same thing to me"? No one thinks about this.

Ketv Interviewer: Did you think about the death penalty when you came to Nebraska?

John Joubert: No, I never did. I never thought about getting caught. Let me change this. I mean, when I first came to Nebraska, I never thought about committing any crimes. Once I did, I never thought about getting caught either.

Ketv Interviewer: You thought you were smarter than that.

John Joubert: No, I never thought about not getting caught. It just, for some reason, wasn't an issue. I wasn't able to think beyond acting out the obsession.

Narrator: Psychiatrists who interviewed Joubert after the murder said he had a schizoid personality disorder with obsessive-compulsive behavior. Omaha psychiatrist Dr. David Kentsmith wrote, "Such persons are at high risk to repeat their crimes. There are several instances in which such individuals, who were thought to have been successfully treated, once released from a secure and controlled setting, resumed a pattern of murdering."

Ketv Interviewer: Do you think that you're reformed at all?

John Joubert: I believe that I would never kill anyone again, if that's what you mean by reformed. Yes, I know that I could never harm anyone.

Ketv Interviewer: How can you believe that? How can you know that?

John Joubert: I can know it. I can know it because I can see people. I can empathize with people. This is something that was absent for me when I was on the streets. I can know it because I can look at what I've done and know that it disgusts me and that I hate that part of myself. And because I'm in touch with my feelings now, I'm not hiding from them.

Ketv Interviewer: [unclear: "How you can know it."]

John Joubert: Well, two things. One, you [unclear: "never can't know" / probably "never can know"], because obviously I'm never going to be trusted again. And second, I'm never going to be released, so it's never going to be put to the test.

Unidentified Speaker: He is a cold-blooded killer, and that's just the way he is. And like he said, if you let me out, I'll just go kill someone today, or try to kill somebody today. And he's that way all the time. He liked to be around little boys, but I think he used those younger friends so that he could continually to hunt, and he wasn't so obvious by himself, because he was in with those younger people while he was hunting, looking for his victims.

Ketv Interviewer: It was part of the plot.

Unidentified Speaker: Part of the plot, part of the plan. Yeah.

John Joubert: No. See, that's not true. It's just not.

Ketv Interviewer: How do you explain what you did to innocent boys?

John Joubert: I don't. It's been suggested, and I've even thought of this, maybe I was taking it out [unclear: "of" / probably "on"] myself. These boys were at the age when I would have felt the strongest and earliest desires for independence. [unclear: "I just know it's a theory."] There are other things. Part of what makes me believe that there really were loud arguments between my parents is my response to arguments today. I can hear an argument between two people that has absolutely nothing to do with me, and I'm nervous, and my stomach flips. I want to leave the room. It makes no sense. It's the anxiety that I feel, I mean, and that the fantasies took that away.

Ketv Interviewer: I hear that in some ways you got a lot of gratification out of the killings.

John Joubert: [unclear: "Describe." / possibly "Define."] The murders provided material for the violent fantasies. That's all of the gratification there was.

Ketv Interviewer: How so? You mean it provided material for the violent...

John Joubert: The fantasies were accompanied by self-stimulation. I could think about the murders again, and some of the fantasies paralleled the murders.

Ketv Interviewer: Some of the psychiatrists said that you saw violence and sex as almost the same.

John Joubert: I wasn't sexually aware then. I hadn't had sex. I was 20 years old. Nowadays, a 20-year-old not having sex seems to be a virtue. Then it wasn't. It was actually an object, or a reason for ridicule. At any rate, that's [unclear: "a decoration" / possibly "a digression"]. No, I wasn't confusing violence and sex. Sex just wasn't an issue.

Ketv Interviewer: Did you continue to have the fantasies in prison?

John Joubert: Yes. Oh, yes. Um, it was around 1990 that I started [unclear: "making success" / possibly "having success"] and stopping them.

Ketv Interviewer: How?

John Joubert: [unclear: "She had willpower" / probably "Sheer willpower"], nothing else. I would just say, "That's it, that's enough. I'm not going to do this anymore." I could do that for two or three days. And [unclear: "the comeback is"], eventually I couldn't keep them out of my head. At some point in '94 and '95, at the end of '94, early '95, I started asking people if they knew anyone on the streets who would be willing to volunteer their services, a therapist, a psychologist. I started working with a psychologist in February of '95. We've been working for 16 months. We've made a lot of progress.

Narrator: Joubert attributes much of his progress to his new love, Teresa O'Brien of Ireland. The mother of three children, she began corresponding with Joubert a few years ago. O'Brien is here now to share Joubert's final days.

Teresa O'Brien: I don't like the term girlfriend. It's very, it's very, I don't know, it's almost demeaning. It doesn't make, it doesn't sum up what John and I have together. We're best friends. We love each other dearly. We share everything.

Narrator: Teresa O'Brien is now Joubert's strongest advocate.

Teresa O'Brien: People talk about John as a monster, and nobody's willing to think about him as a man who is, 12 years later, has spent a hell of a lot of time thinking about this and searching himself and talking about himself, trying to find a reason. And nobody really wants to know that. And if I say, I have said that, and one of the interviews I did, I said that, and I got a responding letter which said that I was being duped, that John was a predator then and is a predator now and is preying on me. And that I find that hurtful, because I know this man. I've been writing to this man every day for the last three years.

Narrator: Many people in Nebraska cannot see beyond John Joubert's monstrous acts. The memory of his brutal crimes will haunt them forever.

Investigator: I still get very emotional over the parents. [unclear: "Four parents was"] poor, pitiful times they had to go through. And Pat knows this better than I do: the number of police officers who died in their forties prematurely that worked in this case. I think the number is about five or six, [unclear: "in a fat heart attacks"], and it just, uh, you know, just [unclear: "sitting up"] happened. That's all. It's just a [unclear: "warp"] time in history for us. And that's what, those are the heroes. The parents, and of course our two little precious boys, and, and then those lawmen and those families. Those are the heroes. I don't even think of this other guy. That's, that's in the hands of the people of Nebraska.

John Joubert: Now I recognize that the law enforcement people are part of the community as well. I apologize to them as well. You know, they, they have seen a lot of the things that the community hasn't seen. They saw, they picked up the bodies. I know this. I can imagine there were nightmares from that. I know exactly what they saw.

Ketv Interviewer: You did it.

John Joubert: I know, that's what I mean. And it's, it's never left my mind. And I know it's never going to leave theirs. And I can't take that away.

Witness: I don't think people realize how much even witnesses are affected by this. I mean, you know, the families, I can't even imagine how they must feel. But I mean, what it does to your life just to witness something. I mean, it's unbelievable.

Ketv Interviewer: What, if anything, that you could hear from him, would you want to hear?

Victim'S Relative: Nothing.

Ketv Interviewer: Nothing?

Victim'S Relative: I don't believe his apologies are totally sincere. And they might be, I don't know, but I wouldn't, nothing. Nothing at all. It's too late. Oh, yeah. It was too late right after that. I mean, there's nothing that that man could tell me that would make me feel better at all.

Ketv Interviewer: What about why? Would you like to know that?

Victim'S Relative: No, because I don't think there was, I don't even, I don't think that, I just think he's a sick man. I mean, I don't even know that he knows why. And nothing. Like, you know, I went over that too. It's like, what would make me feel better? Not a darn thing.

Narrator: The clock is ticking for John Joubert. He spends his time visiting friends and consulting with attorneys, hoping for a reprieve.

Ketv Interviewer: And you don't see any justification to removing John Joubert from the face of this earth?

John Joubert: You tell me, what one good thing will it do?

Ketv Interviewer: Perhaps take away people's fear that you could ever get back out [unclear: "of" / probably "on"] the street and do what you did again?

John Joubert: It's already done. [unclear: "I'm honest" / possibly "In all honesty"], I will sign any paper that will keep me in prison for the rest of my life. John Joubert is more than someone who has murdered three children. John Joubert has been alive for almost 33 years. I was on the streets for 20 years before I was arrested, and I certainly did a whole lot more of my life before then, and I've done a whole lot more of my life afterward, and the public knows nothing of this. I don't know if they care to. They're right, they probably don't, but they've never been told either.

Ketv Interviewer: You could never forgive him?

Victim'S Relative: Never. Nope. And, no, never. You know, these two boys, and I, you know, Richard [unclear: "stepped in that much" / probably "Stetson"]. I don't know too much about him, but I mean, they had so much going, I mean, that was taken away from them.

Ketv Interviewer: Here you are, pleading for your life. And back 12 years ago, you sat with those boys pleading for their life, and you didn't listen to them. Why should we listen to you?

John Joubert: Because you're not me. You're not who I am, you're not... You're not killers.

Carol Kloss: Barring any last-minute delays, John Joubert will die in the electric chair this Friday. Some people think the story ends there, but there are too many people touched in too many ways, and too many memories scarred by the crimes of John Joubert. I'm Carol Kloss. Good night.

Unidentified Speaker: [unclear: "Good night."] [53:45 to 55:07: no speech in the machine transcript; programme close.] ---