The Bayou Strangler

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In January nineteen sixty four, Ronald
Dominique was born. His parents lived in

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a trailer park along with baby Ronald
and his five older siblings, and the

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family struggled financially throughout Ronald's childhood and
teenage years. There wasn't much joy to

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be found at school for Ronald.
Ever since he was a kid, he'd

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struggled to make friends. He wasn't
interested in any of the things that the

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other boys his age seemed to be. He didn't have any talent at playing

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sports, and when he got older, he didn't have any interest in partying

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drugs or alcohol. The other kids
at school thought that he he was weird

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because he was a poor communicator and
always seemed sad, so, like most

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kids do, they made fun of
him, which only got worse when they

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found out that he was gay.
During his late teens, Ronald had started

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sneaking out to visit a nearby gay
bar, but he was spotted there by

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some of his classmates. Interestingly,
the classmates who saw him there gave no

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explanation as to why they had also
been at the same gay bar. Despite

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his difficult circumstances, Ronald was determined
to succeed graduating high school and then making

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it to college. However, he
only made it halfway through his computer science

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degree before he gave up and decided
to drop out. Because he never got

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a degree, the only jobs that
he was able to apply for were unskilled

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labor, and because he had a
problem with authority and never wanted to commit

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to anything, he struggled to hold
down a job at all. In June

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nineteen eighty five, Ronald was arrested
for the first time, but it would

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not be the last. The charges
against him were for sexually harassing someone over

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the phone, but he was only
made to pay a fine of seventy five

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dollars. For almost a decade,
he stayed on the right side of the

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law, getting more minimum wage jobs
and then quitting them. During the periods

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of time where he was unable to
support himself, he lived with one of

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his older sisters or his mother.
The next incident took place in August of

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nineteen ninety six, when a partially
clothed teenage boy threw himself out of a

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window of Ronald's sister's home. When
approached by concerned neighbors, the boy told

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him that he had been sexually assaulted
by Ronald, who had then tried to

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kill him before he managed to escape
through the window. The victim went to

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the police, resulting in Ronald's rest. However, when the time came for

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the case to go to courts,
the victim was nowhere to be found.

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When investigators discovered that they didn't even
know the boy's real name, the charges

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against Ronald were dropped. In July. The next year, Ronald found another

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victim. This time the boy wasn't
able to escape. Nineteen year old David

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Mitchell was hitchhiking home from a family
birthday party when Ronald offered him a ride.

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David's partially clothed body was found two
days later, dumped in a ditch.

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When the autopsy revealed the presence of
ditchwater inside his lungs, but no

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evidence that he was under the influence
of alcohol or drugs, the medical examiner

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ruled the cause of death was accidental
drowning, a decision that David's family strongly

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disagreed with. For one, David
had always been a very strong swimmer,

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and the water level of the ditch
was really low. According to David's father,

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it was impossible for his son to
have drowned in such shallow water unless

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there was foul play. Also,
David's pants had been pulled down, which

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seemed unlikely to have happened during an
accidental drowning. Over the next five years,

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Ronald settled into a pattern. He
preferred younger men. His youngest victim

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was a sixteen year old boy,
while his oldest was forty six, but

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he didn't mind whether they were gay
or not. The majority of his victims

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were African American. He located his
victims in two ways. Either he would

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approach them in gay bars and invite
them home with him, or he would

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offer them a ride in his pickup
truck while they were out walking. He

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had a few strategies that he'd use
to convince men to come home with him,

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always focusing on offering them things he
thought that they could not resist.

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If they were an addict, he'd
offer them drugs or alcohol. If they

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needed somewhere to stay, he'd offer
to let them sleep on his couch,

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and sometimes he'd tell them that he
had a girlfriend and offer them the opportunity

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to take part in a threesome.
Once the victim accepted David's invitation, it

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always went the same way. He'd
take them back to the trailer where he

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lived and then physically overpower them until
he managed to tie them up. Then

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he would sexually assault them, strangled
them to death, and then disposed of

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their bodies in several remote locations where
they would remain undiscovered for days or weeks.

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In April two thousand and five,
investigators began to realize that several of

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the murder victims were connected. They
had started to notice the similarities in the

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way that these young men were being
tied up, assaulted, and strangled,

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and suspecting that they had a serial
killer on their hands, the police departments

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officially handed over the case to the
FBI. By two thousand and six,

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Louisiana was terrified of the serial killer
that had been publicly nicknamed the Bayou Strangler,

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but for almost nine years, investigators
had been unable to find the killer.

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Finally, there was a break in
the case when a man named Ricky

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Wallace came forward claiming that he had
been assaulted a few months earlier. He

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told the police that a man had
invited him to come back to his trailer

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with him, promising that they could
have a threesome and take drugs. However,

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once he got insight the trailer,
there was no sign of a girl.

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Instead, the man asked if he
could tie Ricky up, explaining that

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his mystery girlfriend was into bondage.
By this point, Ricky was not enjoying

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the situation he was in, but
the man let him leave without a fuss.

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When investigators asked if Ricky knew the
identity of the man, he gave

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them a name, Ronald Dominique.
The police weren't sure how seriously to take

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Ricky's story. He was a drug
addict and they'd had issues with him in

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the past. However, they were
desperate for any leads in the case,

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so they questioned Ronald and took a
sample of his blood, which he gave

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willingly. That blood sample turned out
to be worth its weighting gold when it

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provided a match to seamen samples that
had been left behind on two of the

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Bayou Strangler's victims. A warrant was
put out for Ronald's arrest, and he

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was located in a homeless shelter.
On the first of December two thousand and

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six, when he was asked why
he moved out of his sister's house and

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in to the shelter. Ronald responded
that he'd known he was going to be

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arrested soon, and he didn't want
to cause any trouble for his sister,

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so he decided to move out right
after the sample of his blood had been

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taken, considering that he had evaded
police for almost a decade. Once Ronald

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was in custody, he made things
very easy for investigators at the police station.

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He confessed to killing twenty three men, confirming his involvement by providing details

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that had not been released to the
public. Despite admitting to being a serial

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killer, Ronald wasn't entirely willing to
take accountability for his actions. He alleged

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that the men he'd killed had all
agreed to be tied up and assaulted because

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he'd offer to pay them with money
or drugs. He claimed that if any

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of the men had not wanted to
be tied up, he'd do exactly what

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he had done with Ricky Wallace,
let them walk free. When investigators asked

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Ronald his motive for the murders,
he admitted that he had just wanted to

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assault his victims, but he was
forced to kill them to prevent them from

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surviving. As witnesses He claimed his
arrest for sexual assault in nineteen ninety six

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had an enormous impact on his mental
health, and he refused to spend any

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time in prison again, even if
that meant he needed to kill. Ultimately,

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Ronald did not succeed in avoiding jail
time, but he did succeed in

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assaulting and killing enough men that he
received a sentence of eight life imprisonment terms

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without the possibility of parole. Today, he is still behind bars at Louisiana

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State Penitentiary, where he will remain
for the rest of his natural life.

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That is ten Minute Murder for today
brief and bingeable true crime. My name

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is Joe, I'm the host,
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which is cool, but you can
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to get in touch with me,
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your mind that you'd like for me
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questions in general, you can do
that. Joe at ten Minute Murder dot

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com And this one comes from Trent
in Lincoln. Hello, Joe. I

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know you've covered stories of people like
John Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy in past

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episodes, but those were all longer
episodes. I do like to hear the

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long ones on occasion, but I
more like the ten minute ones. Any

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chance you'll cover some of those in
a shorter form I hope, So thanks

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Trent in Lincoln and Trent, I
think you might be a mind reader,

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my guy. Yes, I'm going
to do both of those actually, John

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Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy in future
episodes, but in the ten Minute Murder

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fashion. I'm going to shorten them
dramatically because those episodes I've done it's been

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a couple of years since I did
those, but those were, you know,

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thirty minutes, forty five minutes.
Those were longer, longer things.

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So we're going to do it in
ten minutes. Fingers crossed that I can

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make that happen. I know I
will be able to, but I hope

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that I can do it in a
way that is makes sense because there's so

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much information in those stories to relate
to you that hopefully I can do it

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justice in ten minutes, and that's
going to do it for this episode.

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Thank you again for listening to Ten
Minute Murder