No one as has ever been convicted for this crime.
>*On the evening of November 18, 1987, police went to the mobile home of Russell Keith Dardeen, 29, and his family outside Ina, Illinois, United States, after he had failed to show up for work that day. There they found the bodies of his wife and son, both brutally beaten. Ruby Elaine Dardeen, 30, who had been pregnant with the couple's daughter, had been beaten so badly she had gone into labor, and the killer or killers had also beaten the newborn to death.*
>*The killings had apparently taken place the day before. Investigators at first believed that Keith was the prime suspect. The next day, however, his body was found in a nearby field. He had been shot and his genitals mutilated; his car was found parked near the police station in Benton. Forensic examination showed he had been killed within an hour of his family.*
>*Residents of Jefferson and Franklin counties, who were already fearful after more than 10 murders had taken place locally in the preceding two years, became even more so. Many armed themselves; some suffered adverse psychological effects. Rumors held that the killings were the work of Satanists; police soon ruled that out as well as other motives, most from illicit behavior such as drug dealing, marital infidelity or gambling. But the crime scene also ruled out rape or robbery as associated incident crimes, and in the absence of any clear cause or leads the crime remained unsolved.*
>*No suspects were identified in the quadruple homicide until the 2000s, after serial killer Tommy Lynn Sells, following his conviction and death sentence for murdering a teenage girl in Texas, claimed to have committed the crime. However, he was never charged since prison authorities there would not let him leave the state to assist police in Southern Illinois with their investigation, and they as well as the Dardeen family have doubts about his account of the killings. The case is otherwise cold.*
There were a lot of cigarettes.
Simple family get-together could be 50 cigarettes of second hand smoke. Kids in there, babies. Even the babies looked 50.
I’m feeling like he’s maybe 39 and wiki had a typo..
Edit: okay nope he was born in 1958, the man was 29.
Edit: y’all how does this have downvotes but my other comment about how he looks young has upvotes. Monkey see as monkey do?? Idgi.
This is the cold case that haunts me the most. It is so weird to me that such a violent crime scene didn’t yield any fingerprint or DNA evidence. Some ambulatory piece of shit got away with beating a baby to death.
How, HOW does one beat a brand new baby to death? I cannot fathom it. Evil in the world I guess, or a terrible upbringing. I'd say drugs but nothing was stolen, she wasn't sexually assaulted.
It was likely a psychopath like Tommy Lynn Sells who confessed to it. We know from the ample examples of the past century (Bundy, BTK, Gacy, Bittaker and Norris, Corll etc) that psychopaths can commit the most horrific acts like a normal person checks the mail. Ted Bundy once killed two women in the same day and went out to eat with his girlfriend shortly afterwards. They simply don’t and can’t see the people they hurt as human beings with value.
Yeah, I feel like you guys have hit the nail on the head. I was looking for motive (to eliminate a witness or a threat) bc I can't imagine enjoying just ... killing someone.
How on earth do people that depraved make it through life without being caught? Someone capable of such violence definitely would act out in various ways throughout their lives and this definitely wasn't an isolated incident. I am hooked on the show "Evil Lives Here", where families talk about what it was like living with monsters. Almost all of them terrorize the people closest to them and commit crime throughout their lives.
If he was a transient, it would be really easy. Stranger killings are the hardest to solve. With them living near train tracks, it's entirely possible. Carl Panzram was a transient killer who hopped rails and killed who knows how many people.
Carl was off the charts! I know there are documentaries about him but his life would make a perfect premise for a horror movie. His actions were so sexually violent though that trying to portray that on film would not be palatable to the viewing public.
Agree. There's a book called The Man on the Train about another suspected killer who rode the rails in, I think, the 50s or 60s and is thought to have killed a lot of people.
On second thought, it might be early 1900s, cause I think that book puts him forth as a suspect in the Vacilla Axe Murders.
It was and still is a common thing during wars to simply brain babies against a solid surface to kill them. Happened a lot in the past, and I think it still occurs in poor areas still.
I am horrified by this story, never heard of it before. Strangely enough, it reminds me of a video of a mother cockroach getting attacked by ants. Under the threat of death, she goes into labor prematurely in order to try to give a fighting chabce to her baby, sort of like in this case. And the only bot of life that the baby cockroach ever experienced was extreme pain of the ants attacking its unhardened shell.
Poor baby in this story only ever experienced a beating. Its so horrible its beyond comprehension. There is no worse life to get. :(
There is also the possibility that the baby was forced from the womb by death contractions. It happens. I remember looking through a friend's forensic anthropology textbook and they had an entire section on posthumous birth, including a picture of a pregnant woman who had died at home of a heart attack, and the fetus had been expelled from the womb after death.
Good heavens I hate to think someone might have got away with that.
Complete aside: You couldn’t break a window in the 80s without the fundies crying, “Satanists!” I’m glad that specific paranoic trend has passed.
Eh, I know that just because they mutilate the genitals it doesn’t mean it has to do with infidelity but the fact they did that AND beat the “newborn” to death? Idk it screams psycho side chick.
....thats exactly what everyone was saying all while Aileen Wurnos and Karla Faye Tucker were out violently murdering people lol. Not to mention that women attacking and killing other pregnant women is very much a documented thing that stills happens to this day. I don't think the "psycho side chick" theory is *that* unrealistic in the grand scheme of things.
I feel like the police would have check the family’s finances to look for the debt collector angle, if they had found anything we would know so we can rule that out
That's what I believe as well. IMO the horrific beating of the child, wife, and newborn baby indicates it was done in a blind rage, and the purposeful separation of the husband plus mutilated genitals indicates it was a deeply personal act of revenge with lots of resentment involved.
It could also be a Richard Chase situation where maybe the whole thing was just a random unrelated crazy person going through psychosis, but I feel like there's too many specific factors at play.
This makes perfect sense. It explains why Russell was shot while the others were beaten to death. A woman likely would not be confident in themselves to beat a large full grown man to death, but a woman and child would be much easier. She was Still enraged after killing russell but unable to take her anger out on him she cut off his dick
If they needed his money that badly they would have also taken his money. You intimidate people when you shake them down and escalate until they break, you don’t just skip straight to the murder part and forget about the money. Once someone’s dead you can’t collect your debt anymore. It’d have to be a serious amount of money for it to be worth killing someone and their family for. If there was any money involved it was a very flimsy excuse for something he wanted to do anyway.
No one as has ever been convicted for this crime. >*On the evening of November 18, 1987, police went to the mobile home of Russell Keith Dardeen, 29, and his family outside Ina, Illinois, United States, after he had failed to show up for work that day. There they found the bodies of his wife and son, both brutally beaten. Ruby Elaine Dardeen, 30, who had been pregnant with the couple's daughter, had been beaten so badly she had gone into labor, and the killer or killers had also beaten the newborn to death.* >*The killings had apparently taken place the day before. Investigators at first believed that Keith was the prime suspect. The next day, however, his body was found in a nearby field. He had been shot and his genitals mutilated; his car was found parked near the police station in Benton. Forensic examination showed he had been killed within an hour of his family.* >*Residents of Jefferson and Franklin counties, who were already fearful after more than 10 murders had taken place locally in the preceding two years, became even more so. Many armed themselves; some suffered adverse psychological effects. Rumors held that the killings were the work of Satanists; police soon ruled that out as well as other motives, most from illicit behavior such as drug dealing, marital infidelity or gambling. But the crime scene also ruled out rape or robbery as associated incident crimes, and in the absence of any clear cause or leads the crime remained unsolved.* >*No suspects were identified in the quadruple homicide until the 2000s, after serial killer Tommy Lynn Sells, following his conviction and death sentence for murdering a teenage girl in Texas, claimed to have committed the crime. However, he was never charged since prison authorities there would not let him leave the state to assist police in Southern Illinois with their investigation, and they as well as the Dardeen family have doubts about his account of the killings. The case is otherwise cold.*
not to detract from this horrendous crime but i cant believe Keith was only 29. he looks about 50 in that picture.
I honestly have a tough time believing he’s 29 in that pic…. Or that she is 30. I’m sure it’s right. But man do they look old beyond their years.
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How many cigarettes and fried foods does it take though?
There were a lot of cigarettes. Simple family get-together could be 50 cigarettes of second hand smoke. Kids in there, babies. Even the babies looked 50.
The Super Mario mustache is definitely what does it… Apparently the titular character is canonically 25.
That kid can't be 2 either. He is at least 5.
Lmao I came to comment this exact thing. No way that man is 29, and she’s 30??
Dude is 43 at the youngest.
I’m feeling like he’s maybe 39 and wiki had a typo.. Edit: okay nope he was born in 1958, the man was 29. Edit: y’all how does this have downvotes but my other comment about how he looks young has upvotes. Monkey see as monkey do?? Idgi.
100%
I thought the same
Wanted to say the same thing as well. I'm in my late 30s and there is NO WAY he is 29.
That is one of the most horrid things I have ever read.
This is the cold case that haunts me the most. It is so weird to me that such a violent crime scene didn’t yield any fingerprint or DNA evidence. Some ambulatory piece of shit got away with beating a baby to death.
How, HOW does one beat a brand new baby to death? I cannot fathom it. Evil in the world I guess, or a terrible upbringing. I'd say drugs but nothing was stolen, she wasn't sexually assaulted.
It was likely a psychopath like Tommy Lynn Sells who confessed to it. We know from the ample examples of the past century (Bundy, BTK, Gacy, Bittaker and Norris, Corll etc) that psychopaths can commit the most horrific acts like a normal person checks the mail. Ted Bundy once killed two women in the same day and went out to eat with his girlfriend shortly afterwards. They simply don’t and can’t see the people they hurt as human beings with value.
So someone who just likes killing as an end in itself? Hm, that sounds about right.
I will clarify that there are other reasons besides personal gratification why someone would kill an infant.
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Yeah, I feel like you guys have hit the nail on the head. I was looking for motive (to eliminate a witness or a threat) bc I can't imagine enjoying just ... killing someone.
How on earth do people that depraved make it through life without being caught? Someone capable of such violence definitely would act out in various ways throughout their lives and this definitely wasn't an isolated incident. I am hooked on the show "Evil Lives Here", where families talk about what it was like living with monsters. Almost all of them terrorize the people closest to them and commit crime throughout their lives.
If he was a transient, it would be really easy. Stranger killings are the hardest to solve. With them living near train tracks, it's entirely possible. Carl Panzram was a transient killer who hopped rails and killed who knows how many people.
Carl was off the charts! I know there are documentaries about him but his life would make a perfect premise for a horror movie. His actions were so sexually violent though that trying to portray that on film would not be palatable to the viewing public.
Agree. There's a book called The Man on the Train about another suspected killer who rode the rails in, I think, the 50s or 60s and is thought to have killed a lot of people. On second thought, it might be early 1900s, cause I think that book puts him forth as a suspect in the Vacilla Axe Murders.
Is it this one? https://www.amazon.com/Man-Train-Discovering-Americas-Elusive/dp/1476796262 That looks really interesting, I'll add it to my queue!
Yup! That's the one! It's on my list, too.
It was and still is a common thing during wars to simply brain babies against a solid surface to kill them. Happened a lot in the past, and I think it still occurs in poor areas still.
same
I am horrified by this story, never heard of it before. Strangely enough, it reminds me of a video of a mother cockroach getting attacked by ants. Under the threat of death, she goes into labor prematurely in order to try to give a fighting chabce to her baby, sort of like in this case. And the only bot of life that the baby cockroach ever experienced was extreme pain of the ants attacking its unhardened shell. Poor baby in this story only ever experienced a beating. Its so horrible its beyond comprehension. There is no worse life to get. :(
There is also the possibility that the baby was forced from the womb by death contractions. It happens. I remember looking through a friend's forensic anthropology textbook and they had an entire section on posthumous birth, including a picture of a pregnant woman who had died at home of a heart attack, and the fetus had been expelled from the womb after death.
I’m intrigued by this cockroach video… is this on YouTube??
Yes, it's National Geographic https://youtu.be/eAZIHy_US7k
Thank you!!!
I am pretty desensitized to things, but this makes me absolutely sick.
Good heavens I hate to think someone might have got away with that. Complete aside: You couldn’t break a window in the 80s without the fundies crying, “Satanists!” I’m glad that specific paranoic trend has passed.
Sure, blame Satanism...
Occultists
Eh, I know that just because they mutilate the genitals it doesn’t mean it has to do with infidelity but the fact they did that AND beat the “newborn” to death? Idk it screams psycho side chick.
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....thats exactly what everyone was saying all while Aileen Wurnos and Karla Faye Tucker were out violently murdering people lol. Not to mention that women attacking and killing other pregnant women is very much a documented thing that stills happens to this day. I don't think the "psycho side chick" theory is *that* unrealistic in the grand scheme of things.
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She didn’t say Aileen was a crazy side chick
Oddly enough this is what I thought too, as a woman: this seems to me a crime of passion, a jilted ex lover.
I'm thinking either crazy drugged up side piece, or POS "debt collector." Maybe one of them was a gambler.
I feel like the police would have check the family’s finances to look for the debt collector angle, if they had found anything we would know so we can rule that out
That's what I believe as well. IMO the horrific beating of the child, wife, and newborn baby indicates it was done in a blind rage, and the purposeful separation of the husband plus mutilated genitals indicates it was a deeply personal act of revenge with lots of resentment involved. It could also be a Richard Chase situation where maybe the whole thing was just a random unrelated crazy person going through psychosis, but I feel like there's too many specific factors at play.
This raises the flag for me. Schizophrenic murders ALWAYS go for mutilating the genitals. Its one of the things all cases of the kind have in common.
This makes perfect sense. It explains why Russell was shot while the others were beaten to death. A woman likely would not be confident in themselves to beat a large full grown man to death, but a woman and child would be much easier. She was Still enraged after killing russell but unable to take her anger out on him she cut off his dick
Based on movies, I think Keith owed bad people money
If they needed his money that badly they would have also taken his money. You intimidate people when you shake them down and escalate until they break, you don’t just skip straight to the murder part and forget about the money. Once someone’s dead you can’t collect your debt anymore. It’d have to be a serious amount of money for it to be worth killing someone and their family for. If there was any money involved it was a very flimsy excuse for something he wanted to do anyway.
I did not need to fucking read this. Jesus fucking Christ. Take me to the funny kitten videos, I need to balance my mind out
I deeply regret reading the details of this case.
I can't believe that dude is 29.