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Predator: The Depraved Acts of Serial Rapist and Cold-Blooded Killer Oba Chandler
The Kindness of Strangers
The year 1989 had gotten off to a rocky start for thirty-six-year-old Joan “Jo” Rogers, her husband Hal and their daughters Michelle, seventeen, and Christe, fourteen. The family, who owned and operated a dairy farm in the village of Willshire, Ohio, was hit by scandal that winter when Hal’s brother John was arrested and charged with raping a former girlfriend at knifepoint.
When investigators searched his trailer, they uncovered a cache of video and audiotapes on which John had recorded himself sexually assaulting two women. One was his ex-girlfriend, while the other was someone much closer to home. Upon discovering nude photos of a clearly frightened teenager and listening to audio recordings of a tearful girl pleading to be left alone, authorities identified the second victim as the Rogers’ eldest child, Michelle.
The horrible secret she had been keeping finally revealed, Michelle explained that she had wanted to tell someone so many times but couldn’t for fear of reprisal. Her uncle, who it turned out had been abusing her since she was fourteen, had warned her time and again that he would kill her if she breathed a word to anyone.