Wayne Nathan Nance was never charged with a crime. He was 30 years old and living in Missoula, Montana, when he died in September 1986 after attacking a couple in their home, according to the Associated Press. The husband, though wounded, shot him. Both members of the couple survived.
Only after his death did investigators connect him to a string of unsolved killings in the Missoula and Bitterroot valleys. In 2021 the Associated Press summed up the official position: Nance was suspected in at least six killings in Missoula and Ravalli counties, and he was never tried or convicted, in part because an intended victim killed him. Because he died before any arrest, none of the cases was tested in a courtroom. What follows sets out what police and reporters have said about each one, and who said it.
He lived in East Missoula, where investigators later searched his home, Angela Marshall reported for ABC FOX Montana in 2020. Another ABC FOX Montana report said neighbors knew him as a hard-working furniture mover. He became known in local reporting as the "Missoula Mauler."
Detective Marta Timmons of the Missoula County Sheriff's Office described him in an ABC FOX Montana podcast segment. "He, like many serial killers, was very charming, though, when he turned on the charm," she said.
The earliest killing linked to Nance is the death of Donna Pounds in Missoula in April 1974. She was the wife of a Missoula minister, WSB-TV reported in 2021, and the mother of some of Nance's school friends, according to the Associated Press. She was shot to death in her family's home.
Nance was 18 at the time. WSB-TV reported that he lived nearby, was friends with her children and was seen outside the house that day. The station said evidence from the scene and from his home tied him to the killing. Prosecutors tried and failed to obtain an indictment against him, the Associated Press reported. No charge was ever filed.
In 1980, according to the Associated Press, the remains of a teenage girl were found east of Missoula. WSB-TV dated the case to 1979. For years she had no name; investigators called her "Betty Beavertail." She was later identified as Devonna Nelson, who was 15.
The two reports differ on how she died. The Associated Press, writing in 2021, said both she and Marci Bachmann had been shot. WSB-TV, in a report the same week, said she had been stabbed. Neither account comes from a court record, and no one was ever charged with her death. She is counted among the killings investigators have attributed to Nance.
A second girl's remains were found east of Missoula in 1984, according to the Associated Press. Investigators called her "Debbie Deer Creek." WSB-TV gave a different date for the discovery, Christmas Eve 1985. She had been shot, both outlets reported.
DNA identified her in 2006 as Marcella "Marci" Bachmann, who was 16, WSB-TV reported. The station said she had lived with Nance, and that photographs of the two of them together were found among his belongings after his death. The Missoula County Sheriff's Office has released a photograph, captioned by ABC FOX Montana as showing Marci Bachmann, also known as Robin, with Nance in the summer of 1984.
Her death was never the subject of any charge.
On December 12, 1985, Michael and Teresa Shook were killed in their home in Ravalli County, according to WSB-TV. The house was then set on fire with their four young children inside; the children were rescued. The Associated Press, reporting in 2021, said Nance is believed to have broken into the home and killed the couple.
WSB-TV reported that two items missing from the Shook home, a ceramic bugling elk and a Kelgin knife, were later found in Nance's home. Investigators have treated the Shook killings as part of the case against him. No court ever weighed that evidence.
In September 1986 Nance went to the Missoula home of his boss, the Associated Press reported, and attacked the couple who lived there, wounding the husband. The husband shot Nance. Both members of the couple survived. Nance died of his wounds, aged 30.
NBC News described the incident as a home invasion robbery; WSB-TV said he broke into his boss's house. The East Idaho News, printing the AP account, said that he died in 1986 after an intended victim shot him.
After Nance's death, investigators obtained a search warrant for his home in East Missoula, according to ABC FOX Montana. Detective Timmons said they found jewelry, photographs and drawings, and women's clothing there. She said killers often keep a trophy to remember their victims.
What investigators found, along with the property reported missing from the Shook house, led them to tie Nance to at least six unsolved cases, the station reported. He was never charged with any of them, and none of the evidence was tested before a judge or jury.
On September 9, 1985, the remains of a young woman were found near Crystal Creek in Missoula County, MTN News reported for KPAX in 2021. She had been shot, according to the Associated Press. For more than 35 years no one could say who she was. Investigators called her "Christy Crystal Creek," after the place where she was found.
Over the decades the sheriff's office worked with forensic anthropologists and a forensic odontologist and searched missing persons records in the United States and Canada, without success, KPAX reported. In early 2021, with money from the Montana Department of Justice's Sexual Assault Kit Initiative, the sheriff's Cold Case Unit sent her remains to Othram, a private DNA laboratory in Texas. Othram produced a genetic profile that let investigators begin a genealogy search. Special Deputies Susan Lane and Diana Parker of the Cold Case Investigations Team traced her relatives to a family in Spokane, Washington, according to Othram's announcement. Interviews and further DNA tests of relatives confirmed the identification.
On May 10, 2021, the Missoula County Sheriff's Office announced that she was Janet Lee Lucas. She was born in October 1960 and grew up in California and Washington, with seven brothers and sisters. She was 23 and the mother of a five-year-old son when she was last seen, in the summer of 1983 in Sandpoint, Idaho. Her son, KPAX reported, spent much of his adult life looking for her. She now has four grandchildren.
Her family described her in a statement as warm and loved, a mother, daughter, sister, aunt and friend. They said they were broken-hearted to learn she had been tragically taken, and that she "never spent one moment without being loved."
No records showed that she had ever lived in or visited Montana, investigators said. The sheriff's office released a photograph of her from 1979 and asked anyone who knew or saw her in or near Missoula in the summer of 1983 and into 1984 to come forward. "Our focus has changed from 'Who is Christy Crystal Creek?' to 'What happened to Janet Lucas?'" Detective Captain Dave Conway said. The case became a cold case homicide investigation.
Because her remains were found near those of Marci Bachmann, the Cold Case Unit began reviewing evidence and reports from the Nance case file for any link between the two, KPAX and the Associated Press reported. Othram's announcement went further, describing her as one of three women once known as Jane Does who are suspected victims of Nance. Sheriff T.J. McDermott said the office was working with the county attorney's office to return her remains to her family. No link between Nance and her death had been announced as of May 2021.
The count of killings linked to Nance has never been settled. The Associated Press in 2021 said he was suspected in at least six. WSB-TV said authorities believed he was responsible for as many as six. ABC FOX Montana said investigators found evidence tied to at least six cases. The five victims named in these reports are Donna Pounds, Devonna Nelson, Marci Bachmann, and Michael and Teresa Shook; the reports do not name a sixth. Janet Lee Lucas's death is under review. A Publishers Weekly review of John Coston's book about the case, published in 1992, put the number at at least four.
Every killing linked to him is attributed, not proven. Nance was never arrested for any of them, never charged and never tried. The one time prosecutors moved against him, over the death of Donna Pounds in 1974, they could not obtain an indictment.
Details of the cases differ between reports. The Associated Press dates the discovery of Devonna Nelson's remains to 1980 and WSB-TV to 1979; the AP says she was shot and WSB-TV says she was stabbed. The AP dates the discovery of Marci Bachmann's remains to 1984 and WSB-TV to Christmas Eve 1985.
Nance was at one time considered a possible suspect in the 1974 abduction and killing of Siobhan McGuinness, a five-year-old Missoula girl, WSB-TV reported. He was ruled out after DNA evidence pointed to a different person.
The journalist John Coston set out the case against Nance in To Kill and Kill Again, published by Onyx Books and reviewed by Publishers Weekly in August 1992. The review said Coston faulted the police for not pursuing Nance more thoroughly, praised the book's sense of small-town life, and found its structure choppy and its psychological analysis thin.
April 1974: Donna Pounds is shot to death in her Missoula home. Nance, 18, a friend of her children, is suspected; prosecutors fail to obtain an indictment.
1974: Siobhan McGuinness, 5, is killed in Missoula. Nance is later considered and ruled out by DNA.
1979 or 1980: Remains of a teenage girl, later identified as Devonna Nelson, 15, are found east of Missoula.
Summer 1983: Janet Lee Lucas, 23, is last seen in Sandpoint, Idaho.
1984 (AP) or December 1985 (WSB-TV): Remains of a girl later identified as Marci Bachmann, 16, are found east of Missoula.
September 9, 1985: The remains of a young woman are found, later identified as Janet Lee Lucas, near Crystal Creek in Missoula County.
December 12, 1985: Michael and Teresa Shook are killed in their Ravalli County home, which is set on fire; their four children are rescued.
September 1986: Nance attacks a couple in their Missoula home; the husband shoots him and he dies, aged 30. After his death, investigators search his East Missoula home under a warrant.
2006: DNA identifies Debbie Deer Creek as Marci Bachmann.
May 10, 2021: The Missoula County Sheriff's Office identifies Christy Crystal Creek as Janet Lee Lucas and begins reviewing the Nance file for a link.