Who Killed Janet Raasch

Janet was going to the University Of Wisconsin-Stevens Point for business. She had last been seen alive on October 11th, 1984.

2 hunters found her body a little over a month later. Her remains were in a wooded area near the university. Unfortunately, her body had been too decomposed to be able to determine the cause of death. They had speculated she had been strangled. The coroner said she had been dead for about a week when she had been found.

Janet grew up on a small farm just outside the tiny town of Merrill Wisconsin. She had been going to college for business. Janet had traded shifts with one of her coworkers so she could go visit her family in Merrill this weekend. Merrill was just over an hour from the University. Friends say she was going to hitchhike home.

Early on in the investigation, they were pretty sure that they had a surefire suspect however prosecutors refused to press charges due to weak evidence. Bernadette Smith, a neighbor of Michael Roy Larsen, who both lived in the neighborhood where Raasch went missing, said she was waking up by a girl crying outside on his lawn. The exact date she was unsure of. Was around the 8th she said. This female was uncontrollably crying on his lawn when she yelled out the window to see what was going on. She heard Larsen's car start-up and start moving. A loud thud was heard and the crying suddenly stopped. Larsen also said he had picked up Janet hitchhiking but dropped her off somewhere else.

In 2013 the police received an anonymous letter. That letter pointed the police in a different direction. They tried many times to get the writer of the letter to come forward to help the police go forward and get any information they may not have. They still to this date have not come forward.

In 2002 a new article written said they had exhumed Janet's body in hopes to find any new evidence with the upgraded technology they have now. They also had a tip that she may have been pregnant when she had been murdered. No evidence helped them in the case.

From the beginning of the investigation, they knew that foul play was involved because when they had found Janet's body, it was first wrapped in a sheet. Then the killer or killers had wrapped it in plastic and anchored the plastic down with metal stakes.

Her parents never forgot that day they had gotten the call from the local police. 5 pm they called and said they found Janet's remains. The one thing her mother said was that at least they found her body "At least we got that."

The officer working on the case now consults the officer there spent most of his career working on this case. Which so far has not led to any new clues or any new evidence.

It has been 38 years now and no one has come forward with any new information. How can this just happen in such a tiny town? A town of only 20,00 can hold on tight to such information is so sad. No family should have to ever go through such pain.

Also interesting fact a couple of places where close family to Larsen had worked, murders had taken place. 5 altogether and three are still missing and two were found murdered.

Wisconsin does hold a few unsolved murder cases just like any other state. Just these small towns should be much easier to find the murderer or is there a bunch of serial killers running loose in my state. Do you think Larsen is guilty?