John Crutchley: The Vampire Rapist Who Walked Free

A Child Born to Disappointment

In October 1946, in Clarksburg, West Virginia, William Crutchley and Mildred Burnside welcomed a new baby into the world. But this wasn’t just any birth—it was supposed to be a do-over. A cosmic correction to the tragedy that had struck the year before when their daughter, Donna June Crutchley, went in for emergency surgery and never came out.

Losing Donna shattered Mildred. When she learned she was pregnant again, she clung to the idea that this was fate’s way of making things right. She didn’t just hope for another daughter—she expected one. So when the nurses handed her a baby boy, the moment that should have been filled with relief and joy was replaced with something else entirely.

The Wrong Child from the Start

From the second John Brennan Crutchley took his first breath, he was already a disappointment. His mother didn’t see him as her child—she saw him as the wrong child. The baby she never asked for. The placeholder for the daughter she lost. And since nature hadn’t given her what she wanted, Mildred decided to take matters into her own hands.

For the first six years of John’s life, she dressed him as a girl. If he protested, she ignored him. If he did something to irritate her, or if his father found a reason, the punishments were brutal. The beatings were frequent enough, but some left more permanent marks—like the times his fingers were burned with an iron. John would later recall that on at least a few occasions, they hit him so hard he lost consciousness.

A Quiet, Reclusive Mind

John didn’t grow up roughhousing with other kids or riding bikes around the neighborhood. He withdrew, spending most of his time alone, buried in books about electronics and technology. In a world where people had been nothing but cruel, machines made sense. They didn’t judge him. They didn’t hurt him. They did exactly what they were supposed to do.

By the time he was a teenager, his obsession had become a skill. He repaired electronics for extra cash, and eventually, that talent got him into college. He earned a bachelor’s degree in physics—one of the few things in his life that was entirely his own. But if anyone thought education would steer him toward a stable, productive life, they were about to be very, very wrong.

The Engineer with a Dark Side

By 1969, John Crutchley had checked off all the traditional milestones—college degree, marriage, a promising career in engineering. But like most things in his life, stability was an illusion. His first marriage ended before he even finished his master’s degree, leaving him free to reinvent himself. Again. He took a job at Delco Electronics in Kokomo, Indiana, working with cutting-edge technology. But when he abruptly moved to Fairfax County, Virginia, the company noticed something strange—important materials had vanished. An internal investigation was launched, but no one could tie the missing equipment to Crutchley. So he walked away, unscathed.

Then came a familiar pattern. A new state, a new job, a new wife. This time, he was working for major electronics firms in Washington, D.C. before yet another sudden relocation—this time, to Florida. And, once again, when he left, sensitive materials disappeared. Only this time, the stakes were higher. His employers weren’t just tech companies. He had ties to the FBI, CIA, U.S. Navy, and NASA. And when he left, he took classified information from all of them.

If Crutchley had been a little more careful, he probably could have kept collecting secrets indefinitely. But in the end, his downfall wasn’t a security breach or an advanced cybersecurity team tracking stolen data. It was a 19-year-old lady who fought to survive.

Thanksgiving Weekend Turns Into a Nightmare

Her name was Laura Murphy, and she was hitchhiking in Malabar, Florida. It was Thanksgiving, and Crutchley was home alone for the weekend—his wife and son had gone to visit family in Maryland. He stopped to offer her a ride. She accepted. She asked if he could take her home. He agreed, but said he needed to grab a notebook from his house first. It was a lie.

By the time Laura realized something was off, they were already parked outside his home. He invited her inside. She declined. He didn’t care. He attacked her, strangling her with a ligature until she blacked out. When she came to, she was naked, tied to his kitchen countertop. He had set up lights and video equipment, preparing to document exactly what he was about to do. Then, the horror began.

The Vampire Rapist

Crutchley sexually assaulted Laura, but that wasn’t the only thing he wanted. Using syringes, he extracted her blood—and drank it in front of her. Afterward, he dragged her to the bathroom, wrists and ankles shackled, and left her in the bathtub. Hours later, he returned to do it all over again. Then he came back the next morning.

By the third time, Crutchley had to leave the house. He warned Laura not to try escaping—his brother, he claimed, would find her and kill her if she did. Laura didn’t listen. As soon as he was gone, she climbed out of the bathroom window and crawled toward the road—still naked, still bound at the wrists and ankles. Cars drove past her, ignoring the sight of a bruised, blood-drained woman struggling to get help. But eventually, someone stopped.

She was so traumatized that at first, she didn’t even agree to press charges. But at the hospital, doctors determined she had lost 40–45% of her blood. If she hadn’t been found, she would have been dead within 12 hours. When she finally regained her strength, she told investigators everything. And that’s when they got a warrant for John Crutchley’s house.

The Evidence That Took Him Down

In Crutchley’s home, police found his videotape of Laura—though, conveniently, the parts where he raped her and drained her blood had already been erased. But that wasn’t the only thing they uncovered. Tucked away in his belongings was a thick stack of index cards—each one containing names, addresses, phone numbers, and disturbing notes about his victims. Some were just personal details. Others listed sexual preferences and descriptions of their encounters. When investigators reached out to these individuals, a horrifying pattern emerged. Many described Crutchley’s sexual habits as escalating from “kinky” to outright assault.

The evidence was overwhelming. But for one FBI profiler, this wasn’t just a case of a violent rapist. It was something much worse.

FBI Profiler Robert Ressler Steps In

Robert Ressler, one of the pioneers of criminal profiling, was brought onto the case. He didn’t need much time to form his conclusion. “I was very glad they asked me to get involved,” Ressler later said. “Because while the police knew they had caught a dangerous rapist, I thought it probable that they had a serial killer in custody.”

To Ressler, this wasn’t an impulsive crime. Crutchley had been practiced, methodical, controlled. The way he restrained Laura, drained her blood, and left no trace of his previous victims suggested this wasn’t his first time. If others before her had been less lucky—if they hadn’t escaped—then they were probably dead.

Crutchley’s ability to evade detection for so long pointed to a level of caution and organization rarely seen in offenders who strike only once. He moved across state lines frequently, worked in high-security fields, and had a documented habit of stealing classified materials without getting caught. If he had applied that same precision to violent crimes, it was entirely possible that there were victims scattered across multiple states—women who had vanished without a trace, their fates buried in the gaps of Crutchley’s well-documented but largely unexamined history.

A Shocking Defense

While law enforcement built their case, Crutchley had an unexpected ally—his wife. Instead of condemning him, she defended him. She dismissed Laura’s experience as an exaggeration, claiming that she and John had engaged in similar encounters themselves. According to her, what happened to Laura wasn’t rape or torture—just a “gentle rape, devoid of any overt brutality.” She genuinely believed that Laura should have been grateful. But public opinion—and the weight of the evidence—were against her. Realizing there was no way out, Crutchley pleaded guilty to kidnapping and sexual battery.

Justice (Sort Of) Catches Up to Him

John Crutchley was never formally connected to any murders, though investigators suspect he was involved in several across the country. For his crimes against Laura, he was sentenced to 16 years in prison—but was released after only 11. The very next day, he was arrested again for testing positive for marijuana. In Florida, this counted as a third strike, earning him an automatic life sentence.

In prison, things got weirder. Guards discovered 13 genital piercings he had somehow managed to acquire behind bars. He died in March 2002. Officially, the cause was autoerotic asphyxiation gone wrong. Which, honestly? Seems about right.