The Michigan Murderer: John Norman Collins and the Ypsilanti Terror

Hello, this is Radio Free Flint. You're listening to Arthur Bush. Today's episode is with author Gregory Fronier, who's written a book about serial killer John Norman's Collins. Mr. Collins operated around the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor in the late 1960s. He was convicted of killing a young lady, sentenced to life in prison without parole. Mr. Collins' crimes is believed to kill several other women, both in Michigan and as well as California, gripped the state of Michigan and the nation in the vastness of and the brutality of his killings. John Norman Collins gave rise to the term serial killer. Before that, we never really referred to them as serial killers. This Radio Free Flint podcast comes to you by way of anchor.fm. We also have a website which is located at www.radiofreeflint.media. That's www.radiofreflint.media, where you can see this episode in video or follow any other podcast that episodes that we've released. And we hope that you would do so. Also, uh we plan to put out a newsletter in the near future. And if you'd like to uh get a copy of our newsletter once a month, uh please go to the website and subscribe, or you can just send us an email and uh we'll take care of it that way. Thanks again for joining us. Here's the episode. Okay, we listened to Radio Free Flint. Today my guest is Gregory Fournier, a retired professor who lives in one of the greatest weather places in the United States, San Diego, California. Welcome, Greg. Yeah, thank you for having me. Well, uh Greg, uh, you uh this is your second round here with me, and you're the first author that I've invited back twice. So uh either that says I'm hard up for guests or you're really good. And uh my audience really liked your uh your uh time with us when you talked to us about the purple gang. And uh so I thought I I thought I'd work on another book that you did, uh although it's a couple of years ago. Um this fascinating case. Uh it's uh unsolved murder, the John Norman Collins case. And I'd like to uh talk to you about that. You you wrote a book about it.

Yeah, Karen Salani, John Norman Collins Unmasked. And the unmasked part is that I don't feel that there was ever a good uh account of uh of who he was and uh you know how he got that way. And uh uh and it's actually been pretty well received. The first book that came out, uh I hate to give a plug for it, but it's called The Michigan Murders. And uh the guy who wrote that wrote it five years after the fact. Uh, and I wrote my book over 50 years after the fact. So I had the benefit of hindsight, but I also had the benefit of being on the campus at the time, understanding the the campus culture, being in uh that neighborhood, which was just south of uh uh Eastern Michigan University's uh campus. And uh, you know, the students called it the student ghetto because the homes were you were living, you were you at one time lived in Ypsilani at the same time that John Norman Collins lived there. We were uh students at Eastern, he was a year ahead of me, but he lived a block down the street from me. And before I knew about him and any of this uh you know ugly business, uh, I had had a couple of uh I don't want to call them run-ins, but encounters uh with him. And uh they were always negative. And uh uh, you know, one time he took a swing at me. Actually, he was trying to clothesline me while I was walking down the street. Um and I turned around real quick, you know, to get in a defensive position because I didn't want the guy to jump me from behind. Uh I didn't know what was going on, and uh and he just kept walking and walking and walking. I I watched him uh walk to his home. Or well, he was renting a room in a small little boarding house, and uh, so I knew where he lived then, but I again did not know uh what he was up to, and very few people uh knew what he was up to. But uh what he was up to is murder, he murdered, as far as I can discern, seven women, and he put many more women, young women, uh in harm's way, uh asking them to get on his motorcycle or get in his car, or you know, let's go here and there. Um, and a lot of them just felt uh I've spoken to a good many of these ladies, and they just had a kind of a an uneasy feeling about him, you know, a bad vibe. But on the other hand, there were people I've spoken to that did get on the motorcycle, he didn't murder them. Uh uh and you know some would say, you know, he seemed like a nice guy, but he had no trouble getting a date. He didn't have to kill these women to have sex with them, uh, to put it bluntly. And uh uh so it it comes down, and I'm gonna just jump to the chase with my opinion, and that's all it is, uh, is that John Collins was a uh uh a control killer. Uh there's a term for it I just had it and it slipped out of my mind. Power and control. And I think that appealed to him a lot. And he had uh many chips on his shoulder, but I think he had a big one here from a domineering mother, and he was the third child uh of a divorce, and you know, I'm gonna uh venture to say that uh he was the third child, he was an the unwanted child. Uh and there's background that I give in the book about his father and his mother.

Yeah, let's uh let's let's go back here for just a second and set the stage. Uh uh this this guy became famous. In fact, uh some people think that he gave definition to what was his the the term serial killer, which until the 60s, we really never had that in our lexicon in Michigan or anywhere else, did we?

No, it they were called multiple murders, multiple murderer at the time, and it wasn't until a few years later the golden age of serial killers uh would be the 1970s through the 1980s, and all of the big names that we're all so familiar with, and they've had book after book and video after video on them.

Um he roamed the streets in the in the late 60s.

Yes, uh-huh. He was before them. And I dare say that he was the prototype uh for Ted Bundy. If you you know study both of those serial killers, you'll find that Bundy was so much like Collins, psychologically, uh socially, uh, you know, both uh were ambitious. Uh, you know, they there were differences, of course, but how he killed and uh who he killed, very similar because they they always uh you know went for either the college-aged uh young woman, or in John Collins's case, he killed two teenagers, a 14-year-old and a person who was 16, but she had only been 16 for 20 days. So essentially she was 15 years old.

So uh now Collins was a student uh as well, right?

Yes, he was an English student who was trying to get his uh uh uh credential in uh elementary education. Uh the you've got the primary, you know, the the early grades, and then you've got the you know fourth, fifth, sixth grade, in some cases seventh grade. Uh so he was going for the uh uh you know younger students and he wanted to be a uh uh a PE teacher and with an English uh endorsement. You know, it makes it a lot easier to get a job uh if if you uh can teach something else. And but he his I think his main uh ambition there was to be a coach and work with kids.

Now he Collins also uh fit in at East in the Eastern Michigan University community at the time.

Yeah, and I can give you a little uh scenario about that or synopsis, I should say. Uh he did his first year of college at Central Michigan University in Mount Pleasant. His brother went there, his brother was, I think, three or four years older, and uh he lived with his in his brother's house of where he was renting. Uh, but that first year he just didn't like it, didn't feel comfortable in Mount Pleasant. And so he wanted to get closer to home, and because he was pining for his high school girlfriend, who they had broken up, and he couldn't get over it, you know, a very common story. You know, the the man just can't face the fact that she's not interested anymore, you know, doesn't feel comfortable uh with him. And uh so he got back uh uh closer by coming to eastern Michigan, which was about 50 miles from his home in Center Line, a little bit north of Detroit. Uh I think Center Line is kind of city within a city, I think, uh uh within Warren, Michigan. And he uh would have, you know, he could ride with a his motorcycle uh uh and in an hour or less be home. Uh and uh he tried to get back uh with his girlfriend once he got back to Ypsilanti, that had to be in 1966, and uh he asked her out on a date, and I talk about it in the book, um, and he says, Do you think we he could get back together again? Um, and basically she said no. So I think he felt like he had the rejection by uh of his mother on the one hand, and the rejection with the girlfriend on the other. And I don't think that he was emotionally, psychologically um able to get over either one of those things, and I think he developed anger to a point of murder.

Well, now he was a he was in a fraternity, I read someplace.

He was a theta chi, which was the animal house fraternity on Eastern's campus, and there were a bunch of jacks who were dedicated to party and hardy, drinking a lot of alcohol, and bagging women. I'm trying to think of a better way to say it, but that's essentially what it was. And of course, when the new freshman class comes in, they hold these uh uh kegers and so on, and they draw a lot of you know young women to be said, it'd be a crowd, three, four hundred people. They'd have to close the street, and uh and so I think he saw that as uh as a way to to meet women.

Well, Greg, uh this case this case drew more than uh a little attention in Michigan at the time because I remember uh when I was a kid, this scared the hell out of a lot of people.

And the reason I named the book the way I did, Terror in Ypsilani, was because uh the fear was profound and widespread there more than anywhere. Um and I've had so many people who were children at the time uh remember their parents not letting them go out of the house, uh just being very protective, clamping down on them. And that leaves a big impression on a on a young kid.

Yeah, now you would think that uh somebody who was, you know, becoming a household name within southeastern Michigan would have been somebody whose dirty deeds, if you will, uh would have carried him into infamy for a long time, but his fame really was short-lived.

And you know, I have a theory, I believe it's more than a theory on why. And it was because how his case was handled, and uh Neil Fink and Joseph Lewis L, uh Detroit lawyers, were were his lawyers, and uh they uh Neil in particular was a very tenacious lawyer, and uh you know he'd object at the top of, you know uh, you know, just something come up, bang, he'd be on it. Uh so it was not a real smooth trial, but the real story for Collins not being better known has to uh go to the prosecutor in uh Washtenaw County, and he had uh the year before uh had a man who was a killer of two homosexual youths. And uh he lived in uh uh his name was Ralph Nuss, and he lived in Ann Arbor, I think. And uh one of the kids uh he killed was uh you know, kids, uh 18, 19, 20 uh years of age, was from Ipsy, and the other was from of all places, Windsor, Ontario. And uh he was convicted of those murders, and then there was some kind of change in the Michigan court procedures or in the sentencing law. I'm not exactly certain what that uh circumstance was, you know, at the top of my head, I could I could find out, but uh and so Nuss uh uh because of the changes in sentencing and so on, his lawyer got him off. And uh so Delhi, the uh prosecutor in Ann Arbor, uh wanted you know to put him back behind bars. He was still a dangerous man as far as he was concerned. And Nuss was able to walk on that. And part of the reason is that uh there was uh both of the murders uh were to were tried together, and so to he didn't have a second case to fall back on. So by trying to go after Nuss again was double jeopardy, and he got out. Okay, now talking about Collins. When that case came out, uh the prosecutor remembered what had happened just uh a year previous, and he made the decision to only prosecute Collins for one of the murders, and I don't think he thought of the larger aspect of it in that to be officially FBI certified serial killer, uh, you have to have three separate murders with a cooling off period, uh, similar MOs, and there were four or five different categories. Okay. So Collins was only tried for one of the cases, even though there were other very strong cases.

And there were six other, were there six other victims?

There were six other victims, and one of them was from uh California, and that was a slam dunk case, uh which I talk about in the book, and it involves Governor Ronald Reagan and Governor William Milliken. Um and Milliken would not extradite Collins, even though there was a better case in California, and he would have gotten did they have the death penalty then? He would have gotten the death penalty if he had been convicted, but there's no question uh that the the uh prosecutors out there had uh all the evidence uh they needed, physical and circumstantial evidence. Um so at any rate, uh two, three of the other uh Michigan murders, uh Delhi could have uh brought a case for them, but he wasn't aware of you know how history would his decision would tend to uh cloak Collins in some anonymity. Uh because he if he had been a serial killer, other people would have written about him and you know he would have been right with the the rest of of uh the the infamous serial killers.

When your book came out in I'm sorry, I tucked over top of it.

Excuse me.

When when your book came out in 2016, it sort of stirred up the hornet's nest a little bit, and there became some interest in in the DNA evidence that had been developed. And I think it was the Detroit Free Press, or it might have been you, discovered that at least uh two samples, DNA samples from two two of the victims had never been tested. They had possession of it, but they didn't proceed to do testing for some reason.

Uh Collins uh to talk about that first, uh continually refused to give DNA until it was uh state law that all prisoners had to you know give saliva and or blood samples, whatever. Um but uh by the time they uh came around to DNA, one of the cases, uh a family uh brought the case with the the DNA, and uh well they brought the case, and uh somebody else was determined to have killed that that victim, and it was assumed that Collins killed Jane Mixer, and uh DNA evidence in the 1980s, I believe it was, uh proved that the person who had murdered uh Mixer was someone else. So that's the one DNA aspect. Now, the other uh that I heard from Washtenaw County Sheriff uh uh Doug Harvey was that they found DNA on the hosiery of the next to the last victim. Her name was Alice Callum or Calom, I'm not sure how to pronounce her name. And uh apparently she had been riding on the back of his motorcycle in a short skirt, and he had reached back and you know, touched her on the thigh with you know sweaty hands. So he got epophilial on uh family.