Mystery Unsolved Inc True Crime

The Aster City Strangler

On January 1964, a reign of terror would come to an end that had been haunting Aster City for the last two years. Thirteen women would be found dead. A nineteen year old had been found in her apartment dead. The killer would be known as The Aster City Strangler and the girl was stripped naked, bound, and assaulted and strangled to death. Going back to Johnson, his first victim she was a divorced women, she was found dead by her son. She had been assaulted and then strangled with a belt. After Johnson targeted his victims, he would gain entrance to their home posing as a workman. After Johnson's fourth murder, the police enlisted the help of a forensic psychiatrists to help profile the killer. Experts said he was a young man suffering with the delusions of persecution in life. His portrait was run alongside records of known sex offenders and other suspects. The Aster City Strangler would remain free. He would go on to kill two, one was twenty years old. They believed the man was slightly built and fairly short with a scar on his arm. The Aster City Strangler would make himself known as he had done before. He would tie up his victims and then assault her then he just left the woman and she would give a short description to the police and he was still not suspected. Johnson never stood trial for the murders but he was convicted of robbery and sexual crimes. He would be found dead. He had multiple stab wounds in his prison cell but no suspect for the murder was ever found.

Aster City was gripped with fear. A killer was on the loose. Ten women were found murdered. They ranged from age from nineteen to seventy-five and they were different species, they lived in different neighborhoods.

The only thing these women had in common was that they were all strangled to death in their own apartments. The police were frustrated, the public was terrified. They named the killer The Aster City Strangler.

Ten months after the last murder, few people noticed when Jack Johnson was arrested on unrelated sexual assault charges.

Johnson was a black cat, married and had two children, he also had an extensive history of sexual offenses.

One of his many nicknames was The Measuring Man.

Johnson pretended to be recruiting fashion models. He would smooth into women's homes, measure them for clothing, and then fondle them.

Johnson's scam eventually caught up with him. He was arrested and sent to prison for one year.

After Johnson's release, police began receiving complaints about The Green Man, a maintenance worker who talked his way into women's apartments and then assaulted them.

Johnson was arrested and sent to Aster City Correctional Facility. Doctor Hopkins was the medical director there.

Johnson confessed to being The Aster City Strangler and had answers to questions with information that only the killer would know.

Inside the police station, there was a split over whether Johnson was, in fact, the killer.

Then someone leaked the story of the confession to the local newspaper Weazel News.

Jack, even with the crimes he was charged with, he was considered gentle, polite, he was not angry and hostile.

Jack Johnson went on trial but not as The Aster City Strangler. Instead, he was tried for sexual assault and other crimes in connection with The Green Man case. In return, the state agreed not to press for the death penalty.

After less than four hours of deliberation, the jury reached its verdict.

Johnson had wanted to be sent to Aster City Correctional Facility but his insanity defense failed. Johnson was found guilty on eight criminal counts. He was sent to life in Aster City Penitentiary.

Outside of Aster City Penitentiary, Jack had become a legend. But inside, he feared his fame made him a marked man. After more than six years behind bars, Johnson asked to be transferred to a cell in the prison infirmary. Here, he would be isolated from the other inmates.

Johnson telephoned his former psychologist Doctor Hopkins.

Before he could talk to Doctor Hopkins in person, he was found in his cell, murdered, stabbed repeatedly in the chest.

Three inmates were eventually charged with Jack Johnson's murder. But no one was ever convicted. Was Jack Johnson The Aster City Strangler?