The Calder crimes

The Calder crimes:  not the happiest blog topic, but they are part of our collective history and you'll likely hear about them soon enough if you have not already, and if you're not from this area, that might come as a rather rude surprise to you.  It'd be good to have general context in case anyone asks you about those crimes, due to the re-heightening of public awareness, so here's the scoop:

Texas Killing Fields reportedly hits theatres either tomorrow or next week, depending on which source is reporting accurately.  This movie is a dramatization of the unsolved murders of multiple young women, four of whose bodies were dumped in fields along Calder Road on the west side of IH-45, roughly catercorner from Centerpointe. 

Movie poster courtesy Internet Movie Database
(www.imdb.com)

Prior to the development of this motion picture, this gruesome serial killer story was remembered mostly by locals who had lived in Clear Lake and north Galveston County long enough to have been witness to the news coverage that occurred around the time of the murders.  One can still find relatively unsophisticated "whodunit" type summaries of the crimes on the internet that pre-date the recent revived interest in the cases, such as this old one.  It is true that locals historically referred to the area as "the killing fields".  The reference was subsequently changed to either "the fields" or the "Texas killing fields" to distinguish it from the Cambodian genocidal dumping grounds of the same name. 

But now the local media, including Galveston County Daily News and Bay Area Citizen, have published articles heralding the release of the movie and describing the crimes upon which it is reportedly based, at least loosely.  I can't comment on the content of the movie, and how it reflects upon our general area, because I haven't seen it.  From internet sources, I can't even tell whether they filmed it here or elsewhere. (Ordinarily I would never patronize a movie of that type, but because of the local connection, I think I'll check it out).

So yes, it is generally agreed that there was a serial killer.  Yes, some of those crimes were committed near here.  Yes, the murders remain unsolved.  And yes, there's a movie about to hit the big screen.  Those murders happened a long time ago (roughly 1983-1991) and it is speculated that the serial killer has since died, because no additional related crimes appear to have happened after a certain date.

Incidentally, one of the murdered girls found in the Calder Road field was Laura Miller, who was apparently abducted from the C-store near the corner of FM 518 and Hobbs (you can see that gas station as you go across the FM 518 overpass heading south on IH-45 toward the League City Parkway exit).  Following her death, Laura's father founded the volunteer mounted search and rescue group known as Texas Equusearch, which went on to become world-renowned for its skills in locating missing persons (and recently was credited with locating the young man who spent two snake-bitten days at the bottom of a League City manhole). 

At this point I could leave you with a YouTube embed of either the "Texas Killing Fields" movie trailer, or a segment showcasing Texas Equusearch.  Easy choice.