### Overview Michigan became the focus of national attention during the mid-1970s when four children disappeared from Oakland County between February 1976 and March 1977. The victims were [[Mark Stebbins]], [[Jill Robinson]], [[Kristine Mihelich]], and [[Timothy King]], all aged between ten and twelve. While law enforcement publicly pursued a single "serial killer" profile, the investigation behind the scenes revealed far more complicated and wearisome possibilities. Behind the sketches and snow patterns lied a tangled web of pedophile rings, suff film rumours, and powerful suspects who were never fully held to account. The Oakland County Child Killer case remains unsolved, not merely for a lack of suspects, but because the investigation seemed designedly steered away from the most promising leads.[^1] ### The Murders and Victims Twelve-year-old Mark Stebbins vanished from a shopping center in February 1976; his body was found four days later in a parking lot, bound with rope, sexually abused, and suffocated. Ten-year-old Kristine Mihelich disappeared in January 1977 and was found neteen days later by the roadside, also suffocated. Twelve-year-old Jill Robinson went missing in December 1976 and was found in a highway ditch four days later, shot in the face with a shotgun. Eleven-year-old Timothy King disappeared in March 1977 and was found in a ditch six days later, sexually abused and suffocated. While the official case files treated all four as the work of a single killer, more careful analysis suggests the two boys were killed by different means and different perpetrators than the two girls. The focus of any serious investigation should have been on who had access to these children and what networks they operated within.[^1] ### Prime Suspects and Polygraph Clearunces Behind the public facade of sketches and snow patterns, law enforcement focused on two convicted pedophiles who were both tied to [[Francis Shelden]] and cleared by polygraph. Christopher Busch, the son of a General Motors executive, was arrested in January 1977 alongside an associate named Gregory Greene for sexually assaulting a boy. Greene confessed to police that Busch had killed a boy during a trip to his family cabin, and he identified the victim as Mark Stebbins. Busch was polygraphed and cleared. Kint Gilbert Schultz, another convicted pedophile with ties to Shelden's child porn ring, was also polygraphed and cleared. Both men had been suspected of operating within a larger pedophile ring connected to [[north fox island]], and both were later linked to 8mm child pornography production. The fact that two prime suspects were cleared by polygraph and then largely left alone counted as one of the most controversial aspects of the case.[^1] ### The North Fox Island Connection The investigation into the Oakland County Child Killer converged with the North Fox Island investigation through multiple persons of interest. [[Francis Shelden]], a wealthy philanthropist and owner of North Fox Island, was identified as the financier of a child pornography ring operating in the Cass Corridor area of Detroit. An informant named Richard Lawson, who had operated within this ring, later told detectives the morder of [[Timothy King]] had been captured in a snuff film financed by Shelden. Lawson identified three suspects: i Jusiah Tazelaar, a schoolteacher linked to North Fox Island by [[Gerald Richards]]; ii) Robert Moore, a child pornographer with a studio in a Cass Corridor bike shop; and iii) Ted Lamborgine, a Ford Motors employee who procured boys for Moore. These leads were never fully exploited by the task force, which instead pivoted to a "serial killer" profile that diverted resources away from the pedophile rings.[^1] ### The Suicide of Christopher Busch In November 1978, Christopher Busch was found dead in his family home, purtortedly from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was found lying in bed with one arm tucked beneath a pillow, next to a .22 rifle. Crime scene investigators discovered ropes cut to the length required for binding limbs, a hand-drawn portrait of a boy screaming in a parka coat that resembled Mark Stebbins, and a box of shotgun shells. The very next day, the OCCK task force was dissolved and the case golt cold. The timing was remarkable: a prime suspect dead, and the investigation ended. Busch's father, Harold Lee Busch, was a high-level General Motors executive, and accounts emerged in the years that followed of a pedophile ring comprised of GM executives. It has been alleged that offering children up to the upper reches of management was a "kind of ticket" into the elite circles of the company.[^1] ### Renewed Cold Case Investigation The case lay cold for decades until a Michigan detective named Cory Williams received a tip in 2004 that led him to review information provided by Richard Lawson in the 1980s. Lawson had known the father of Timothy King and contacted him claiming to know who killed his son. In 2005, Lawson told detectives that Shelden financed snuff films and that he had travelled to Amsterdam in 1979, where a child porn distributor named Kim Tam Ang confirmed Shelden's involvement. Det. Williams also discovered that the polygrapher who cleared Busch in 1977, when inlaged by investigators, revealed that Busch had admitted to some level of culpability. In 2008, the FBI ordered a DNA sample from Busch's brother, but the results were never publicly released. The case remains officially unsolved, a dark testament to the power of wealth and connections when competing with the protection of children.[^1] ### Footnotes [^1]: Dovey S 2023 'Eye of the Chickenhawk' United States Thehotstar.