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Teens killed with screwdrivers by serial killer who then cried to police

Between 1980 and 1982, Minneapolis residents lived in fear of Paul Michael Stephani, a serial killer who earned the nickname 'Weepy-Voiced Killer' for making emotional calls to police after each brutal attack

[ Paul Michael Stephani with bandage]

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Stephani saught help for the wound Denise inflicted

A man with a chilling weepy voice terrorised a community for two years, chasing teenagers down with ice picks and screwdrivers and then phoning the police in tears.

From 1980 to 1982, Minneapolis locals nicknamed the serial killer "The Weepy-Voiced Killer. It was New Year's Eve of 1980 when he launched his first attack. Tragically, 20-year-old Karen Potack, a University of Stevens Point student, did not survive her night out at a nightclub with friends.

As the venue was shutting at 1AM, her friends realised Karen was nowhere to be seen. Karen had left early and was walking home when she was attacked, as per Morbidology.

She was hit across the head with a wrench and left for dead. Local police received a telephone call at approximately 3.a.m As his voice trembled with emotion, the weepy voiced killer made his first confession. "There's a girl hurt here," he sobbed before suddenly ending the call. When officers and paramedics reached the location, they were appalled at the state of the scene.

The beating was so vicious that it exposed Potack's brain. Remarkably, she survived the ordeal but was left with memory loss.

[: Karen Potack]

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Karen Potack miraculously survived the attack

On June 3, 1981, a group of teenage lads stumbled upon a horrific scene. While they were walking through the woods they discovered a body.

It was later identified as 18-year-old Kimberly Compton from Pepin. She had been stabbed 61 times, primarily to the chest, with an ice pick and strangled with a shoelace.

Following Kimberleys murder, police received another phone call, remarkably similar to the call they had received after the first attack. The man on the other end declared: "God damn, will you find me? I just stabbed somebody with an ice pick. I can't stop myself. I keep killing somebody."

Officers managed to trace the phone call to a payphone at a pub opposite the bus depot at 9th and St. Peter Street. When they arrived, nobody was there.

Two days after Kimberleys body was discovered, the man rang 911 again. He told officers he hadn't intended to kill the girl and that he would surrender himself.

[ Kimberly Compton]

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Kimberly Compton was stabbed and strangled with a shoelace

He didn't. Instead, he telephoned police and told them "I'll try not to kill anyone else," adding that he "couldn't help it. I don't know why I stabbed her. I'm so upset about it."

Despite the fact that the killer had by this point made multiple phone calls, police had failed to find him.

On the 21st of July, 1982, 33-year-old Kathleen Greening from St. Paul was due to go on holiday to Mackinac Island with her best friend, Carol Kellogg. On the morning they were meant to leave, Carol planned to head to Kathleen's home for breakfast before the pair left.

When Carol arrived she knocked on the front door, but there was no answer so she let herself in through an unlocked door.

She called for Kathleen, and then saw the light on in the bathroom with the door ajar. To her horror, Carol found Kathleen dead, naked, face up in the bath tub with her head under the tap and her knees bent towards the front of the tub.

Police ruled her death as an accident. It was only years later it was linked with the weepy voiced killer. The fourth victim was 40-year-old nurse from the Minneapolis side of the river, Barbara Simons.

[Stephani had worked a number of odd jobs]

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Stephani had worked a number of odd jobs

On the of August 5, 1982, Barbara had been at the Hexagon bar where she met her killer after offering him a cigarette. She told a waitress that the man was going to give her a lift home.

She was found dead, stabbed to death, the following morning by a paper boy. Once again, the killer phoned the police and said: "Please don't talk, just listen... I'm sorry I killed that girl. I stabbed her 40 times. Kimberly Compton was the first one over in St. Paul."

Police scrambled to find the man who had given her a lift home. Witnesses gave police a description of a man around 40 years old, 6 feet tall and weighing 185 pounds, with a dark complexion and thinning black hair.

But before they could find him, he found his next victim, 19-year-old Denise Williams from Minneapolis, a sex worker.

The pair agreed on a price and Denise climbed into his car. The killer attacked her with a screwdriver, stabbing her a total of 15 times.

In a final desperate act Denise managed to grab a glass bottle that was lying in the footwell and struck her attacker in the face before escaping from his car. This undoubtedly saved her life.

[ Denise Williams]

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Denise Williams fought back, saving her own life

When the man returned home to his flat, he noticed that the wound on his face was quite severe and decided to seek medical treatment. When he called the St. Paul Fire Department asking for help, the department noted the caller had "aural similarities" to the so-called "Weepy-Voiced Killer" phone calls.

The man was identified as 37-year-old Paul Michael Stephani. He grew up in Austin, Minnesota, and moved to St. Paul in the 60s where he worked as a hospital cleaner and a shipping clerk; he unloaded lorries at a steel mill and a tool company.

He later said that he kept losing jobs and blamed the epilepsy he had suffered on his old job. Angry, he returned to the area around the factory.

This was where he saw Karen Potak. "When I picked her up, she had no jacket and I thought I'd take her for a cup of coffee," Stephani confessed. I just wanted to warm her up and my mind snapped or something."

Stephani was soon arrested and was charged with attempted second-degree assault. He was found guilty of the murder of Barbara Simons.

[Barbara Simons agreed to get a lift from the depraved killer]

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Barbara Simons agreed to get a lift from the depraved killer

However, due to insufficient evidence, he couldn't be linked to the other murders. "We never had quite enough evidence to get him charged," said Lt. Joe Corcoran of the St. Paul Police Department.

However, in 1997, Stephani confessed to the murder of Kim Compton after discovering he had cancer and less than a year to live. "I'd rather go to the grave knowing this is all taken care of and off my chest," Stephani said.

"To this day, I can't believe it. I wake up in the morning thinking and hoping I'm dreaming all this. But then I say: 'No, Paul, you're still in jail.' I don't know what to do except say I wish I could turn back the clock."

He said she had just got off a bus in St. Paul and walked to Mickey's Diner, where Stephani was having coffee. "We started talking and I told her I'd show her around town," Stephani said.

"I thought I'd drive by the river and maybe we'd see the Delta Queen or have a picnic. But in 15 minutes, she was dead."

He also admitted to the murders of Barbara Simons and Kathy Greening. While he was found guilty of the murder of Simons, he never actually confessed.

He had never even been considered a suspect in the death of Greening; he never made a phone call to police following this murder. Investigators revealed that during his confession, he gave details about Greening and her house that only the killer would have known.

Furthermore, investigators also discovered the name "Paul S" in Greening's address book which contained his phone number. The year after confessing, Stephani passed away at the Oak Parks Heights maximum security prison.

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