Edward Warren Smith, a 27-year-old Black/African American man from Milwaukee, disappeared on June 14, 1990, after a night out in the city. Smith, who was also known as “Eddie” and was nicknamed “Sheik” because of the turban-style head covering he was known to wear, was last reported seen leaving the Phoenix Bar in Milwaukee that evening. Investigators would eventually determine that Smith had crossed paths with Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer, an acquaintance who had recently moved into Apartment
213 at the Oxford Apartments, 924 North 25th Street. Smith never returned home and was never seen alive again.
According to Dahmer's later statements to investigators, Smith accompanied him to his apartment, where Dahmer drugged him and then strangled him. Dahmer subsequently dismembered Smith's body and attempted to preserve portions of his remains. Accounts of Dahmer's confession indicate that he initially placed Smith's skeleton in a freezer, hoping that freezing it would sufficiently dry the bones for preservation. When that did not work, the skeletal remains were eventually destroyed with acid. Dahmer attempted to dry the skull separately by heating it, but the process destroyed it as well. Consequently, investigators were never able to recover identifiable remains belonging to Smith.
Smith's disappearance remained unresolved for more than a year. The investigation changed dramatically on July 22, 1991, when Tracy Edwards escaped from Dahmer's apartment while partially handcuffed and encountered Milwaukee police officers. Edwards led officers back to Apartment 213. Once inside, police discovered photographs depicting dismembered victims and human remains, evidence that immediately transformed the encounter into a major homicide investigation. Dahmer was arrested, and during extensive interviews afterward he began confessing to a series of killings committed over many years.
During those confessions, Dahmer identified Smith as one of the people he had murdered. Federal investigative records show that Smith had previously been listed as missing and that authorities subsequently updated their records to identify him as one of Dahmer's homicide victims. Smith's family was officially notified of his death on July 29, 1991. Because his remains had been destroyed, investigators had to rely heavily on Dahmer's detailed confession, the circumstances of Smith's disappearance, and the other evidence developed during the broader investigation rather than a recovered body.
Prosecutors ultimately brought a formal homicide charge against Dahmer for Smith's death. On August 22, 1991, Smith's killing was among three additional cases charged against Dahmer, bringing the number of Wisconsin murder counts against him to fifteen. Contemporary reports stated that the new charges were based substantially on Dahmer's statements to police and described Smith as a victim whose body had been dismembered and disposed of after the killing. No other suspect was identified in Smith's death, and the investigation attributed the homicide to Dahmer alone.
Dahmer eventually entered guilty pleas to fifteen counts of first-degree intentional homicide in Wisconsin. Because guilt was no longer disputed, the 1992 court proceeding focused primarily on whether he was legally responsible for his actions or should be found not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect. Prosecutors argued that his planning, efforts to conceal the killings, disposal of bodies, and repeated attempts to avoid detection demonstrated that he understood his conduct and could conform his behavior to the law. The defense presented psychiatric evidence in an effort to establish legal insanity. The jury rejected the insanity defense and found him criminally responsible for the killings, including Smith's murder.
On February 17, 1992, Dahmer received fifteen consecutive life sentences for the Wisconsin murders, ensuring that he would spend the remainder of his life in prison. He later received another life sentence in Ohio for an earlier murder. For Smith's family, the prosecution provided an answer to a disappearance that had remained unexplained for more than a year, but there was never a body to recover or bury. Years later, Smith's sister Theresa publicly recalled that Dahmer personally acknowledged killing and dismembering her brother when she visited him in prison. Dahmer remained incarcerated until November 28, 1994, when he was killed by another prisoner at Columbia Correctional Institution.
