Craig Price: The Teenager Who Terrified Rhode Island

Craig Price: The Teenager Who Terrified Rhode Island Craig Price looked like the kind of teenager you might ask to help you with your groceries. Quiet. Polite. A little awkward. But at thirteen, he stabbed his neighbor to death in one of the most...
Craig Price: The Teenager Who Terrified Rhode Island
Craig Price looked like the kind of teenager you might ask to help you with your groceries. Quiet. Polite. A little awkward. But at thirteen, he stabbed his neighbor to death in one of the most brutal crimes Rhode Island had ever seen. And it did not stop there. Before he turned sixteen, Craig killed four people, including two young children, all while blending into his suburban neighborhood. This episode breaks down how someone so young could commit crimes so violent, how his babyface kept him hidden in plain sight, and how the justice system struggled to respond. We are talking about one of the youngest serial killers in United States history, and the case that still sparks debate about juvenile crime, parole, and whether some people are ever safe to release.
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In the late 1980s, Rhode Island had a teenager who looked like he should be snacking on popcorn at a little league baseball game.
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Not murdering his neighbors.
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But behind that baby face was something a lot darker.
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A 13-year-old with a kitchen knife, a violent home life, and absolutely no regard for other human beings.
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And what started two doors down didn't in there.
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This is the story of Craig Price, the youngest known serial killer in U.S. history.
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Before we jump in, if you like your true crime, brief and bingeable, you're exactly where you need to be.
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Hit follow now for at least two new episodes every week.
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This is 10-minute murder.
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Let's get into it.
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[Music]
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In the late 1980s, Warwick Road Island looked like a Norman Rockwell calendar.
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Modest homes, trimmed lawns, and neighbors who knotted politely without really knowing each other.
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But under that buttoned up column, something brutal was taking shape, and it started two doors down from normal.
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Craig Price didn't look like a threat.
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At first glance, he was just a big teenage kid with a football build and a grin that made teachers think he was polite, and moms think he was safe.
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That smile, it did a lot of heavy lifting, because behind it, Craig was already unraveling. His home life was absolute chaos.
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Inside the Price family's ranch-style house, the air was thick with yelling, fear, and the kind of tension that makes kids flinch when the front door opens.
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Craig didn't push back at home, though.
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The fear went inward until it started leaking out.
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He didn't turn into the school bully overnight, but the signs were there, outbursts, weird detachment, and a growing habit of lashing out.
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People noticed he wasn't quite like the other kids, but no one connected the dots, not yet.
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Craig was angry, and he was about to start finding places to put that rage.
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Craig was 13 when he broke into a neighbor's house, two doors down from his own house, the kind of distance you walk without thinking.
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The woman who lived there was 27-year-old Rebecca Spencer.
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Whether Craig knew her by name or only from passing glances, no one knows for sure.
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But what he did that night was deliberate.
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He wasn't looking to steal anything. He wasn't desperate. He was angry, and he wanted to take that anger out on someone who could not fight back.
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He grabbed a knife from Rebecca's kitchen and moved through the house like he had nothing to lose. When he found her alone, he stabbed her 58 times.
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That number alone tells you everything you need to know about the level of violence he was capable of.
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Rebecca never had a chance. There was no struggle, no time to call for help, and no one suspected the teenager with the round face and polite smile.
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There was no connection between them that the police could find, so they moved on, and so did Craig.
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Two years went by, Rebecca's case sat unresolved. Warwick had decided this was a one-time horror story.
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But Craig, he was still close by, bigger now, more confident, and still holding on to everything he hadn't been able to say out loud.
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At 15, he walked out of his house and across the shared yard, and the house next door lived Joan Heaton, 39, along with her two daughters.
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Jennifer was 10, Melissa was 7. They thought they were safe in their own home. Every other night, they had been. Craig had other plans.
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Craig had killed once before, and that was all it took to start building a pattern. He broke into the Heaton's home and he headed straight for the kitchen.
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Joan Heaton had bought a new set of knives that very same day. Craig took one of them and got to work.
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He went for the strongest first. Joan was 39 and the only adult in the house. She was the only one who might have been able to stop him.
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Craig stabbed her 57 times. The attack was furious and relentless. But unlike Rebecca Spencer, Joan hadn't been alone.
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Her daughters, 10-year-old Jennifer and 7-year-old Melissa were there and they saw what happened to their mother. When Joan no longer posed a threat, Craig turned to Jennifer.
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He stabbed her 62 times. His anger had not burned out. It was just accelerating. That left Melissa, 7 years old, alone, and terrified.
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Craig took his time. He stabbed her 30 times and then beat her until her skull fractured. He stabbed all three with such force that the knife handles snapped off. The blades stayed in their bodies.
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One was still lodged in Jennifer's neck when the police arrived. The town of Warwick stopped cold. People kept their kids home from school. They added extra locks to their doors.
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Police officers went door to door, trying to track down someone who had crossed the line the town didn't even know existed. Craig didn't leave town. He didn't even leave the neighborhood.
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Just a few hundred yards from the Heaton home stood the price house. And while Craig still had the same harmless smile, police were already paying attention to him.
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By that point, Craig had a short, but active record. Mostly break-ins, enough to make investigators wonder if someone who could sneak into houses might be capable of something worse.
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It wasn't a solid lead, but with two murdered children and a mother brutally attacked, the police weren't passing on anything. They went to the price house and asked to speak with everyone.
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The rest of the family had alibis, nothing suspicious, nothing out of place. Then there was Craig. He had a deep cut on one of his fingers and he didn't have a good explanation for it.
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That mattered because whoever had killed the heatens had blood, the killer left behind their own blood at the scene. They'd also left behind a sock print. Men's size 13.
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Craig wore size 13. The puzzle started to come together and then investigators found pieces of the knives used in the Heaton murders, not blocks of evidence, not theories, physical remnants, hidden in Craig's backyard shed.
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He was arrested just days before turning 16. At the police station, his mother cried while her son, still legally a minor, sat beside her. Craig didn't try to deny anything.
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He admitted to killing Joan Heaton. He admitted to killing Jennifer and Melissa. And then he confessed to Rebecca Spencer also. He was done hiding and his mind, the game was over.
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Because he was still under 18, Craig couldn't automatically be tried as an adult. The most the state could do was sentence him to a youth correctional facility.
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He would stay there until his 21st birthday. After that, he would walk free and the record of what he'd done would be sealed. Craig wasn't quiet about what came next. He told people he was going to make history once he got out.
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This wasn't a theory. He set it out loud. The idea that someone could murder four people before their 16th birthday and then get released before 22 set off alarms across Rhode Island. His case kicked off a wave of legal reform.
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Lawmakers moved to make sure minors could be tried as adults for violent crimes. The problem was those charges couldn't be applied to Craig retroactively.
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So while the state scrambled to close that loophole, Craig sat in juvenile lockup waiting. But if there was one thing working in the public's favor, it was that Craig could not for the life of them stay out of trouble.
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His own behavior became the reason he didn't walk out at 21. He ended up in an adult prison for repeated violent outbursts. His earliest shot at parole was 2009.
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But right before his hearing, Craig got into a fight with another inmate. He stabbed the guy with a makeshift weapon and injured a corrections officer in the process.
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Parole denied. He was transferred to a different facility. Then in 2017, he did it again. Another inmate. Another stabbing. This time, the court handed him another 25 years.
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And with every year that passes, his freedom slips a little further out of reach. Craig Price did make history. He holds the record for being the youngest known serial killer in the United States.
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And if there's any justice at all, that record will stay his.
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[Music]
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Thanks for listening to 10 Minute Murder, bingeable True Crime Stories. I'm Joe, the host, and apparently the guy that tells you gruesome True Crime Stories while you do your daily chores like folding laundry and doing the dishes.
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I can't count the number of times I've been told, "Yeah, I listen to you all the time while I'm cleaning up around the house or I'm mowing the lawn or I'm doing this or I'm doing that."
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Which is fine by me, like listen anytime, anywhere, any place, including at work. That's what some people also tell me. They listen on earphones, it work. But it's just strange to me.
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Like right now, what I'm saying, there's someone listening that's trying to scrape out the old mac and cheese that hardened on their plate.
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And they should have probably rinsed it off before they put it into the dishwasher. But they didn't, so it's hardened on there. They're trying to scrape it off. And it's not really coming off that great.
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And you get frustrated, but you know if you work at it, it's going to eventually come off. Someone's listening to me's "Dude Why They're Doing That Right Now." Which is strange.
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And I appreciate it. If you're a new listener to the podcast, make sure you hit subscribe right now. Go to 10MinuteMurder.com, all kinds of information by the podcast. You can find there at 10MinuteMurder. And if you want to get in touch with me, you can also go there.
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Follow me on socials, by the way. Links for those are in the show notes of this episode.
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And I believe that's going to do it. And because Rochon says that I haven't set it in a while at the end of the podcast, I'm going to say it this time.
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Thank you for listening to 10MinuteMurder. Have a good night.
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night.