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For almost 20 years, David Knotek stood by as his sadistic wife Shelly Knotek abused their friends and family members — and he eventually assisted her with murder.

On Aug. 8, 2003, Shelly Knotek and her husband David were arrested at their home in Raymond, Washington, for a series of brutal murders spanning nearly a decade — after their own daughters had turned them in.

While in custody, David Knotek confessed to killing Shelly’s 17-year-old nephew, Shane Watson, and investigators quickly learned that while Shelly had a long history of abusive behavior and violence, David’s past was much less sinister.

Even when the couple were arrested, their daughters placed almost all of the blame on their mother, claiming David was more like her abused henchman. So how was this man driven to commit such heinous acts of violence?

The Relationship Of Shelly And David Knotek

David Knotek considered Shelly to be “the most beautiful girl” he’d ever seen when they met in April 1982. She was a young, double-divorcée with two daughters, Sami and Nikki. He was working in construction after years of service in the Navy.

Per The Sun, the couple married in 1987 and had a child together two years later. From the outside, the Knoteks seemed like a typical, happy family.

MurderpediaMichelle “Shelly” Knotek had a difficult upbringing, herself.

But quickly into their marriage, Shelly verbally and physically abused David, and he was unable to stand up to her. “The reason why my mom was able to control Dave was because – while I love him – he’s just a very weak man,” Sami recalled.

“He has no backbone. He could have got happily married and been an amazing husband to somebody, because he really would’ve been, but instead, he just got his life ruined, too.”

Abusing Family And Friends In Need

Tragically, David wasn’t the only family member to suffer abuse from Shelly. In fact, most of the abuse was directed towards Shelly’s daughters, but the worst of it was saved for guests the Knoteks invited to stay with them.

In 1988, shortly before the birth of David and Shelly’s daughter Tori, Shelly’s 13-year-old nephew Shane Watson came to live with them. Shane’s father was in and out or prison and his mother was struggling with substance abuse.

But almost immediately, Shane learned that he had entered a new kind of hell.

Shelly Knotek began torturing Shane the same way she had been torturing her own daughters — a form of punishment she called “wallowing.” Typically, this involved forcing the children to lay naked in the mud at night while she doused them with cold water. For the girls, wallowing sometimes included being locked in a dog cage or chicken coop.

She would force the girls to cut off tufts of their pubic hair to humiliate them and made Knotek’s younger daughter, Nikki, also a teenager, dance naked with Shane.

And after every violent, sadistic act, Shelly Knotek would flip the switch and shower her family with overwhelming love, all in order to keep them under control.

MurderpediaShane Watson planned to go to the police about the abuse inside the Knotek household — and was shot by David Knotek.

The same year Shane moved in with his aunt and uncle, the Knoteks opened their home to another outsider, a family friend named Kathy Loreno after she lost her job. Loreno, however, was not free of Shelly’s abuse either.

At first, Shelly love-bombed her longtime friend, but The New York Post reported that she didn’t wait long before degrading Loreno too, drugging her with tranquilizers, and starving her by withholding food.

“Kathy was a pleaser and never did anything to trigger such treatment,” said New York Times bestselling journalist Gregg Olsen, whose book, If You Tell, covers the case in great detail. “Shelly delighted in making other people hurt. It made her feel superior. She has never been formally diagnosed as a psychopath, but showed all the traits.”

The Knoteks’ First Murder

After six years of living with the Knoteks, Loreno lost 100 pounds and spent most of her time performing labor naked and sleeping next to the boiler in the basement.

David Knotek helped to torture Loreno, using makeshift waterboarding equipment or duct-taping her arms and legs together before pouring bleach onto her open sores.

MurderpediaShelly Knotek with her longtime friend and eventual victim, Kathy Loreno.

Loreno’s years of abuse, ultimately, came to an end in 1994 when she died, David Knotek claimed, from choking on her own vomit. He also said that he and Shelly never took Loreno to a hospital or reported the death because it would implicate them. Instead, the couple burned Loreno’s body in the backyard and scattered her ashes in the Pacific Ocean.

“All of us will be in jail if anyone finds out what happened to Kathy,” Shelly Knotek then warned her family.

“I don’t think she meant to kill Kathy,” Sami later said. “I think she meant to abuse Kathy, just like she abused us. She got off on it. She liked the power, she liked doing it, and it got worse and worse.”

But not long after that tragedy, in February of 1995, Shane approached Nikki with several Polaroid photographs he had taken of Kathy over the years, showing the tortured woman covered in bruises and sores. He also told her that he planned to go to the police with the photos.

Nikki, young and fearful, told her mother about Shane’s plan.

In response, Shelly convinced David Knotek to shoot the teenager in the backyard, and once again, they burned the body and scattered the ashes.

The Daughters Turn In Their Parents

By 1999, Sami and Nikki had grown into young women and left the home. David and Shelly Knotek’s youngest daughter, Tori, was only 14 and still living at home when a new guest arrived: Ron Woodworth, a gay 57-year-old veteran with a sharp wit and a substance abuse problem.

At the time, David Knotek was working on a contract project 160 miles away.

Like their other guests, Woodworth was at first treated with overwhelming kindness, but soon enough he was degraded by Shelly. Woodworth wasn’t allowed to use the restroom inside the home, and Shelly often forced him to drink his own urine. She once made him jump from the roof of their two-story home and onto a bed of gravel.

She “treated” his injuries with boiling water and bleach, a smell that Tori described as “like bleach and decomposing flesh, like it was burning his skin off… He smelled like that for a month. Up until the very end.”

Woodworth succumbed to his wounds in August 2003, after which Shelly stored his dead body in a freezer for four days until David returned to deal with it. A burn ban was in place at the time, leading David to bury Woodworth’s body in the backyard in the interim.

David Knotek served 13 years of his 15-year sentence for the murder of Shane Watson.

That same week, Sami, Nikki, and Tori reunited at Nikki’s home in Seattle — and agreed to turn their parents in.

Shelly was ultimately charged with two counts of first-degree murder in connection with the deaths of Kathy and Ron, while David Knotek was charged with one count of first-degree murder for Shane’s death.

They each accepted plea deals in exchange for shorter sentences, though Shelly took a rare Alford plea, which allowed her to plead guilty while simultaneously asserting innocence, thus avoiding a public trial that would have revealed the true extent of her crimes.

She was sentenced to 22 years in prison. David Knotek was sentenced to 15.

David Knotek also maintained contact with Sami and Tori, who have said they forgive him for his actions. Nikki, on the other hand, did not.

He was paroled in 2016 after serving 13 years for second-degree murder, unlawful disposal of human remains, and rendering criminal assistance.

Shelly, too, seemed as if she might have been released from prison early for good behavior. She was up for parole June 2022 but that request was denied. As of now, though, her sentence ends in 2025.

“I just wanted people to finally really know the truth,” Sami Knotek said. “When my mom comes out from prison, I don’t want her to be able to hide it. She’s the biggest manipulator of anyone I’ve ever met. I don’t think that she could ever outgrow that. I don’t think that she could ever change.”

Next, learn about another killer mom named Rosemary West, who abused numerous young women — including her own daughter. Then read up on the horrifying story of Louise Turpin, the mother who kept her 13 children captive for most of their lives.

We know cats date back millennia and they even domesticated themselves. But we’re willing to be that most people assume the oldest known pet cat comes from Egypt. However, archaeological evidence suggests that the oldest known pet cats may come from the island of Cyprus.

Cyprus’ cats

In Egypt, cats were worshipped as idols as well as cherished as pets and pest control specialists. For centuries, we’ve assumed that Egyptians were the first to keep cats as pets. But a team of French archaeologists working in the island country of Cyprus has turned the feline companion timeline on its head.

What’s the evidence? Well, the best proof we have that cats were kept as pets rather than simply furry, mouse-hunting neighbors are cat burial sites. People bury their pets – they don’t bury wildlife.

The oldest pet grave we now have is a 9,500-year-old site on Cyprus in the Neolithic village of Shillourokambos. The presumably beloved kitty was buried with seashells, polished stones, and other decorative items.

According to National Geographic (cited below), this “predates early Egyptian art depicting cats by 4,000 years or more.”

The oldest known pet cat

The details of the grave suggest that the feline resting inside is the world’s oldest known pet cat. Of course, there could be gravesites elsewhere in the world that will rewrite the timeline again.

According to Melinder Zeder, a curator of Old World archaeology at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and president of the International Council for Archaeozoology, “The process and timing of cat domestication has been terrifically difficult to document.”

“In the absence of a collar around its neck, the deliberate interment of this animal with a human makes a strong case that cats had a special place in the daily lives, and in the afterlives, of residents of Shillourokambos,” Zeder told NatGeo.

The rest of our earliest evidence for cat domestication comes from ancient Egypt, but the oldest cat mummies date back a “mere” 4000 years.

Researchers have long been confident that felines domesticated themselves much earlier, but the Cyprus site is the first solid proof. We already knew cats were present on the island (and therefore valued in some way since someone had to bring them there) because archaeologists found bones. But a grave site suggests something quite different and more significant in terms of what cats meant to people.

“The first discovery of cat bones on Cyprus showed that human beings brought cats from the mainland to the islands. But we couldn’t decide if these cats were wild or tame,” said a study author. “With this discovery, we can now decide that cats were linked with humans.” — WTF fun facts

Source: “Oldest Known Pet Cat? 9,500-Year-Old Burial Found on Cyprus” — National Geographic

Between 1988 and 2003, John Jamelske abducted women and girls as young as 14 and held them as prisoners in his secret bunker — where he raped them daily.

New York kidnapper and rapist John Jamelske earned many names after the world learned the truth about his crimes, from the “Syracuse Dungeon Master” to the “Ariel Castro of Syracuse.” Over a 15-year period, Jamelske kidnapped, imprisoned, and systematically raped five women ranging in age from 14 to 53 years.

Jamelske had a handmade underground dungeon in which he kept the women as sex slaves, abducting and releasing them one at a time, keeping some for years and some for a few months. However, Jamelske underestimated his fifth and final 16-year-old victim, and she was able to contact a family member — leading the police straight to Jamelske.

In John Jamelske’s warped mind, the eccentric serial rapist had done nothing wrong. He hadn’t kidnapped and raped these women, but had been in a relationship with them, treating them well.

How John Jamelske Became The ‘Syracuse Dungeon Master’

Twitter/They Will KillJamelske’s victims were kept, often for years at a time, in a cramped and horrifying space hiding below his nondescript suburban home.

John Thomas Jamelske was born in Fayetteville, New York, on May 9, 1935, and started off working in area grocery stores before becoming a handyman. In 1959 he married and had three sons with his wife, a schoolteacher. Jamelske had convinced his father to invest in stocks, and he and his wife received a sizable inheritance when he died.

By 2000, Jamelske had become a millionaire due to the inheritance and some choice Real Estate investments, but despite his wealth, lived the frugal lifestyle of a compulsive hoarder. Jamelske collected a mass of bottles and cans for recycling deposits, and other assorted junk over the years — but by 1988, he had started hoarding humans.

In 1988, as Jamelske’s wife became ill, he devised a depraved way of ensuring he would receive the sex his wife’s illness now prevented. Jamelske built a concrete dungeon three feet below ground outside his ranch house at 7070 Highbridge Road in DeWitt, an upscale neighborhood of Syracuse.

The bunker was eight feet high, 24 feet long, and 12 feet wide, connected to the east wall of the basement via a short tunnel according to Syracuse.com. Access to the eight-foot-tunnel was through a steel door behind a storage shelf. The tunnel, a dank, claustrophobic crawl space led to another locked door, with entry to the dungeon down a small, three-rung ladder. When Jamelske’s wife passed away in 1999, he had already imprisoned and released three sex slaves.

Jamelske made no attempt to provide even a modicum of comfort for his victims. They were forced to live in degrading conditions and subjected to daily rape. Their dungeon featured a foam mattress and a makeshift toilet — a seatless chair positioned above a bucket. Jamelske’s captives bathed with a garden hose in a stained bathtub atop a raised wooden deck. With a drain plug but no plumbing, the water pooled on the cement floor, creating damp and moldy conditions, until it eventually evaporated. Meanwhile, a clock radio and TV connected to an extension cord that ran through a small hole in the wall.

Jamelske’s Suburban Abductions

Jamelske drove the streets of Syracuse kidnapping teenage runaways and vulnerable women, holding them as single prisoners, one at a time. He lured them into his car offering a lift, choosing victims of different ethnicities. They included a 14-year-old girl taken in 1988 and kept in a small well behind his mother’s home, later “upgraded” to his new bunker — where she remained for two and a half years.

The “Syracuse Dungeon Master” also kidnapped a 14-year-old girl in 1995, a 53-year-old woman in 1997, a 26-year-old in 2001, and his last, a 16-year-old taken in 2002, according to ABC News.

Jamelske controlled his ankle-chained victims with threats and mind games to continue the rapes, convincing them that their families were in danger if they disobeyed him. Telling some of his victims he was part of a police sex-slave ring and had to take orders from his bosses, Jamelske even flashed a sheriff’s badge he found on the street years before.

Jamelske convinced some victims that the more pliant they were, the faster his “bosses” might let them out. One victim, a 53-year-old Vietnamese refugee, who spoke little English, was later seen on videotape convincing “the bosses” she should be released according to CNN.

The fourth victim, now identified as Jennifer Spaulding, wanted to write home to her parents in 2001 to let them know she was alive. Jamelske agreed, but only to say she was entering a drug rehabilitation clinic. When her family received and confirmed the letter from her, the police closed her missing person case.

The residents of Jamelske’s upscale neighborhood had no idea the eccentric cheapskate crank was a also deviant kidnapper and raise who ate Viagra like candy. As rape and Old Testament Bible readings from Jamelske became the norm, his victims knew if they did somehow manage to kill him without obtaining the padlock combination to their cell, they would be entombed down there forever.

When the time came to release them, Jamelske blindfolded his victims before releasing them, dropping one at an airport, one at her mother’s house, and another at a Greyhound station with $50 cash.

Police Bungled The Investigation Into Jamelske

YouTubeJamelske’s fourth victim Jennifer Spaulding.

As victims reported their ordeal to the police, their social status as runaways and substance abusers hampered the investigation. The rape kit test for Spaulding showed no evidence of sexual assault, as Jamelske ensured that he had no sexual contact with a victim for several days prior to their release.

After she told police that her rapist drove a tan 1974 Mercury Comet, investigators found one registered vehicle in the New York area. However, Spaulding’s description of the vehicle didn’t match, so officers closed her case. Unfortunately, they hadn’t searched for other years’ models — Jamelske drove a tan 1975 Mercury Comet.

Further complicating things, Jamelske’s victims couldn’t describe where they were held, or who their abductor and rapist was, other than an old white man.

However, in October 2002, Jamelske’s final victim, a 16-year-old runaway from Syracuse, would be his undoing.

The End Of John Jamelske’s Reign Of Terror

Over six months of captivity, the 16-year-old girl convinced Jamelske that she was his friend, and he felt confident enough to take her out to karaoke bars, and for his weekly visit to his recycling center.

On April 7, 2003, at the recycling depot, Jamelske’s captive asked if she could call a church, and he handed her the opened Yellow Pages. When she hurriedly called her sister explaining what was happening, her sister located the business in Manlius, Syracuse, from caller ID, and the police arrested Jamelske with his victim at a nearby car dealership.

Investigators searching Jamelske’s house of horrors and hoarded junk, including over 13,000 bottles, were especially shocked by the depravity of his dungeon. A series of calendars were found, where victims had to systematically mark each date with the code letter “B”, “S”, or “T.” The codes denoted each date a victim was either raped (S), bathed (B), or brushed their teeth (T) and the collective calendars covered a 15-year timespan.

Several videos featured at least one woman on tape, his 53-year-old Vietnamese victim. Graffiti slogans covered some walls, and one victim confirmed a slogan to investigators by phone.

The arrogant Jamelske, 68, thought he’d get a slap on the wrist and community service, but ultimately pleaded guilty to five counts of first-degree kidnapping, and in July 2003, was sentenced to 18 years to life, as reported The New York Times.

The victims were spared from reliving their horror in court, and most of their names have not been made public, with Jamelske’s wealth liquidated and split between them as compensation. John Jamelske himself was denied parole in December 2020.

After learning about John Jamelske, go inside The Disturbing Marriage Of John Wayne Gacy. Then, learn about The Torture Dungeon Of Serial Killer Leonard Lake .

BOCA GRANDE, Fla. — A marlin mount was stolen from a business at Eagle Grille on Harbor Drive in Boca Grande.

According to SWFL Crime Stoppers, the marlin was taken down before Hurricane Ian and placed on the dock.

MARLIN STOLEN
The Marlin was taken down from the business at Eagle Grille located on Harbor Drive in Boca Grande before the Hurricane and placed on the dock. It was last seen on October 28th and noticed missing on October 31st. If you have any information, call 1-800-780-TIPS. pic.twitter.com/g4ukZqUkZr

— SWFL Crime Stoppers (@SWFLCrime8477) December 8, 2022

The marlin was last seen on Oct. 28 and was noticed missing on Oct. 31, according to the report.

Anyone with information can call SWFL Crime Stoppers at 1-800-780-TIPS.

Since being discovered in 1957, the “Boy In The Box” case baffled Philadelphia police. But thanks to genetic testing, the four-year-old victim has been revealed to be Joseph Augustus Zarelli.

In the Ivy Hill Cemetery in Cedarbrook, Philadelphia, there is a headstone that reads “America’s Unknown Child.” It’s a permanent reminder of the child who lies beneath it, a boy who was found beaten to death in a box some 65 years ago. Since then, he’s been called the “Boy in the Box.”

One of Philadelphia’s most famous unsolved murders, the identity of the “Boy in the Box” baffled investigators for years. Since his discovery in 1957, detectives in the city have pursued thousands of leads — some better than others — and come up empty.

But thanks to genetic genealogy and some old-fashioned detective work, the Boy in the Box finally has a name. In 2022, he was finally identified as four-year-old Joseph Augustus Zarelli.

The Discovery Of The Boy In The Box

On February 23, 1957, a student at La Salle College noticed the Boy in the Box for the first time. As the Philly Voice reports, the student was in the area hoping to catch a glimpse of the girls enrolled at Sisters of Good Shepard, a home for wayward youths. Instead, he noticed a box in the underbrush.

Though he saw the boy’s head, the student mistook it for a doll and went on his way. When he heard about a missing girl from New Jersey, he returned to the scene on Feb. 25, found the body, and called the police.

As the Associated Press reports, police responding to the scene found the body of a boy, between the ages of four and six years old, in a JCPenney box that had once contained a bassinet. He was naked and wrapped in a flannel blanket, and investigators determined that he was malnourished and had been beaten to death.

“It’s something you don’t forget,” Elmer Palmer, the first officer to arrive on the scene, told the Philadelphia Inquirer in 2007. “This one was the one that bothered everybody.”

Then, the race to identify the Boy in the Box began.

Who Was The Boy In The Box?

Wikimedia CommonsThe box where the boy was found in 1957.

For the next six decades, detectives pursued thousands of leads in order to identify the Boy in the Box. And they started with the boy himself. An investigation of his body revealed that his sandy hair had been recently and crudely cut — WFTV 9 reports that clumps of hair were still on his body — leading some to believe that his killer had tried to disguise his identity.

Investigators also found scars on his ankle, foot, and groin that appeared to be surgical, and his feet and right hand were “pruny,” suggesting he’d been in water, according to WFTV 9.

But despite these clues, a facial reconstruction, and hundreds of thousands of fliers that were distributed across Pennsylvania, the boy’s identity remained unknown. The Associated Press reports that detectives chased numerous leads, including that he was a Hungarian refugee, a kidnap victim from 1955, and even related to local carnival workers.

Over the years, some leads seemed better than others.

Theories About The Boy In The Box

Of all the leads that investigators pursued while trying to identify the Boy in the Box, two seemed especially promising. The first came in 1960 when an employee of the medical examiner’s officer named Remington Bristow spoke to a psychic. Newsweek reports that the psychic led Bristow to a local foster home.

While attending an estate sale at the foster home, Bristow noticed a bassinet that looked like one sold at JCPenney, and blankets that resembled the ones wrapped around the dead boy, according to the Philly Voice. He theorized that the boy had been the child of the owner’s stepdaughter, an unwed mother.

Though police pursued the lead, they eventually believed that it was a dead end.

Wikimedia CommonsA facial reconstruction of the boy in the box.

Forty years later, in 2002, a woman identified as “M” told investigators that the boy had been purchased by her abusive mother from another family in 1954, according to the Philly Voice. “M” claimed that his name was “Jonathan” and that he’d been physically and sexually abused by her mother. After he vomited up baked beans one night, “M” claimed that her mother had beaten him to death in a fit of rage.

Newsweek reports that the story “M” told seemed credible, as baked beans has been found in the boy’s stomach. What’s more, “M” had said that her mother had tried to bathe the boy after beating him, which could have explained his “pruny” fingers. But ultimately, the police were unable to substantiate her claim.

Thus, the decades passed and the Boy in the Box remained unidentified. But all that changed in December 2022, when investigators in Philadelphia announced that they could finally give him a name.

Joseph Augustus Zarelli, The Boy In The Box

Danielle M. Outlaw/TwitterJoseph Augustus Zarelli had just turned four when his body was discarded in the woods.

On December 8, 2022, Philadelphia Police Department Commissioner Danielle Outlaw announced a breakthrough in the case. The boy found dead in 1957, she said, was Joseph Augustus Zarelli.

“This child’s story was always remembered by the community,” she said. “His story was never forgotten.”

As Outlaw and others explained during a police press conference, Zarelli was identified thanks to genetic genealogy. His DNA was uploaded to genetic databases, which led detectives to relatives on his mother’s side. After pouring through birth records they were also able to identify his father. They also learned that Zarelli’s mother had three other children.

The investigators found that Joseph Augustus Zarelli was born on Jan. 13, 1953, which meant that he was four years old when his body was found. Aside from that, however, the detectives were tight-lipped.

They explained that numerous questions still remain about Zarelli’s life and death. For now, the police are not releasing the names of Zarelli’s parents out of respect for his living siblings. They also refused to speculate on who killed Zarelli, though they noted “we have our suspicions.”

“This is still an active homicide investigation, and we still need the public’s help in filling in this child’s story,” Outlaw said. “This announcement only closes one chapter in this little boy’s story, while opening up a new one.”

After learning about the mysterious boy in the box case, read the tragic story of Joyce Vincent, who died in her apartment and went unnoticed for years. Then, read about Elisabeth Fritzl, who was held captive by her father for over 20 years.