The crimes of child-killer Nathaniel Bar-jonah
THE TERRIBLE CRIMES OF CHILD MOLESTER AND SUSPECTED CANNIBAL NATHANIEL BAR-JONAH
On a cold February morning in 1996, ten-year-old Zach Ramsay left his home in Great Falls, Montana, and started walking to school. It was the same journey he made every day, but this time, he didn’t arrive. His disappearance sparked a police investigation – but the officers looking for the little boy had no idea that their search would eventually lead them to the door of Nathaniel Bar-jonah, one of the worst serial child killers in their state’s history.
EARLY CRIMES
Born David Paul Brown in February 1957, Bar-jonah’s aberrant behaviour began when he was seven years old. He was given a Ouija board for his birthday and invited a five-year-old female neighbour into the basement of his Massachusetts home to see it. But when the girl followed him down into the underground room, he set upon her and began strangling her. She was only rescued when Bar-jonah’s mother heard her screams and came running. She may have been disturbed by her son’s behaviour, but no action was taken. Around the same time, teachers at his school also reported an unsettling habit. In class, Bar-jonah had taken to picking at scabs on his arms and then sucking on the injury. Only later did people realise this was an early indication of his lust for the taste of human blood.
Six years later, when he was 12 years old, Bar-jonah committed another deeply disturbing act of violence against a child. This time, he raped a six-year-old boy he had lured away from home with the promise of going sledding. Despite still being a child himself, Bar-jonah’s appetite for molesting vulnerable youngsters was already fully formed, and he would continue to escalate.
He later confessed that he had contemplated his first murder when he was around 15. Coming across two young boys out riding their bikes, he tried to persuade them to follow him to a cemetery, where he had decided to kill them. But one of the boys sensed something was very wrong and the pair fled. It was to be a lucky escape.
Bar-jonah was still only 17 when he was arrested for the first time, in 1975. After dressing up as a police officer – an act that was to become a staple part of his MO – he made eight-year-old Richard O’conner get into his car and drove off with him. Miraculously, someone saw the incident from their window and immediately reported it. When the real police found the car, the boy was inside – he had been beaten, sexually assaulted and strangled almost to death. Bar-jonah was still with him.
He was convicted, but despite the severity of the incident, he wasn’t locked up. Instead, he was given one year’s probation – which left him free to hunt for his next victim – and not long afterwards, he abducted nineyear-old Mary Patrone, again while masquerading as a police officer. At some point during the sexual assault, Mary began having a fit, so Bar-jonah threw her from the car. A witness captured his registration, and he was arrested, but news of the latest attack was not passed to his probation officer, and he was never charged.
ESCALATING FAST
In 1977, Bar-jonah kidnapped two more boys, this time from outside a cinema while posing as a member of the FBI. He drove to an isolated spot where they were molested, strangled and jumped on them. He left one boy for dead at the scene, and took the other with him. But the abandoned child survived and was able to describe his assailant – at over 20st, Bar-jonah stood out. When he was arrested, they found the other boy tied up inside the boot of his car. The crime was enough to finally get the predator a sentence of 18-20 years for attempted murder. However, he would not stay behind bars for long enough.
Bar-jonah began having sessions with the prison psychiatrist, who he told all about his deviant fantasies, which involved child rape, murder and cannibalism. Because of the severity of the acts described, the decision was made to transfer Bar-jonah out of prison and into a psychiatric hospital in 1979. He would stay there for the next 12 years, until a shocking judgement was made. It was decided by the court that, when sentenced, the state had not met the burden of proof to determine that Bar-jonah was dangerous. So, once again, he was set free, and his insatiable lust for abduction was soon unleashed.
Just weeks later, he spotted a child sitting alone in a car outside some shops and spontaneously attacked. Witnesses reported seeing him open the car door and leap on the seven year old, but when they approached, Bar-jonah fled. He was arrested, given probation and released on the proviso that he left Massachusetts. So, he went to Montana. There, Bar-jonah didn’t stop preying on children, but for a long time, the police had absolutely no idea a monster was operating in their midst.
MISSING CHILD
In 1996, Zach Ramsay went missing. Witnesses remembered seeing him in an alley near to his school. They also remembered seeing an obese man dressed in what looked like a police uniform in the alley around the same time. But no one in Montana had any idea of Bar-jonah’s MO – his probation officer had requested the reports on his previous crimes, but they had never arrived – and the link wasn’t made.
The case landed with Detective Bill Bellusci, and he and his team hunted for Zach, searching parks, rivers and playgrounds, but there was no sign of him. One man came forward to confess to abducting, raping and murdering the boy, but the police were quickly able to establish this was a lie – he was a fantasist who had been nowhere near the scene of the crime. Then, Bellusci’s attention fell on Bar-jonah. He was well known in the neighbourhood for collecting toys, and enjoyed having sales in his garden that were attended by all the local kids. One neighbour later told reporters, “It’s just terrible to think what was happening. I used to say hello to him
once in a while, but I didn’t think about him one way or the other.”
Some parents knew better – Barjonah was suspected of molesting at least one boy he was supposed to be babysitting. However, with no evidence, the police hit a dead end.
Meanwhile, Bar-jonah – who worked as a cook – was inviting his neighbours to barbecues, where he served up homemade burgers and chillis with what he claimed was deer meat from animals he had killed himself. One of his neighbours would describe the taste as “repulsive”.
It wasn’t until 1999 that things began to unravel. Bar-jonah was spotted loitering outside a school, dressed like a policeman and carrying a stun gun. Bellusci instinctively knew the man was on the hunt for his next victim, and pushed hard to get him arrested for impersonating an officer. With Bar-jonah sitting in an interview room at the station, Bellusci was able to get a warrant to search his home for items relating to the charge – and walked into a house of horrors.
The place was a mess, but as the officers began turning the apartment over, they located several items of clothing that proved he had been impersonating members of law enforcement. They also found a disturbing photo album, filled with images of children that had been cut out of magazines. Bellusci was certain Barjonah was a predatory paedophile and applied for a wider search warrant, which was granted.
When the team returned to the house, they found what they were looking for. A US paper detailed their finds, saying, “They discovered tens of thousands of photos of children from the area clipped from newspapers, yearbooks and newsletters. Mixed in with the clippings were thousands of photos of naked and half-naked children, many of which Bar-jonah is alleged to have taken, along with photos of his genitals.”
There were also newspaper cuttings that detailed the search for Zach three years earlier, a set of coded writings, and a list of 22 names. The newspaper report said, “Eight of the boys were known to be Bar-jonah’s victims dating back to his early adulthood in Massachusetts. Another dozen or so children were from the Great Falls area, whom Bar-jonah knew through his affiliation with a local church and adults. Several still have not been accounted for.” Searching further, they found a hook and pulley system set into the ceiling that would later be determined was used for “auto-erotic asphyxiation”, a wooden board with what appeared to be knife marks in it – and a human bone.
MORE HORROR
Bar-jonah was quickly charged with abduction and assault, and it would be his own coded notebooks that took him down. The arresting officers enlisted the help of the FBI and between them managed to crack the ciphers – and what they discovered horrified them.
In them, Bar-jonah detailed how he had abducted, tortured and murdered several boys, before creating recipes that he had given sick names, such as “My Little Kid Dessert” and “Little
Boy Pot Pie”. It was these dishes – filled with the flesh of children he had killed – that he had allegedly been serving at his neighbourhood cookouts. A meat grinder at the house had human hair in it, and a further 21 human bone fragments were found at Bar-jonah’s property
At trial, numerous witnesses came forward to detail their encounters with the serial predator. As well as parents whose children had been molested, and a now-adult Mary Patrone from the 1974 kidnap, a former flatmate of Bar-jonah’s testified against him, recalling how he had seen Zach’s distinctive clothes in their home. Police were also able to establish that Bar-jonah was driving his mother’s car the day Zach was reported to have been followed by an obese man. There was even a note in Bar-jonah’s writings that said, “Zach Ramsay: Died”.
In July 2000, he was charged with the child’s murder. However, the police could not persuade Zach’s mother to accept her son was dead. At one point, a psychic had told her that her son was alive and living abroad. Choosing to cling to that hope, she refused to testify, and the murder charge was dropped. Zach has never been seen again. In the end, Bar-jonah was convicted of kidnapping, aggravated assault and sexual assault of three boys, although he was suspected of being a serial child murderer.
He was sentenced to 130 years behind bars, without the possibility of parole.
In April 2008, aged 51, he was found dead in his cell at Montana
State Prison. Weighing over 21st, he’d died of a heart attack.
‘THERE WERE THOUSANDS OF PHOTOS OF LOCAL CHILDREN’
n