Larry William Eyler: The Interstate Killer
Background
Larry William Eyler was an American serial killer who murdered teenage boys and young men in Illinois and Indiana during the early 1980s. Born on December 21, 1952, in Crawfordsville, Indiana, Eyler later became known as the “Highway Killer” and the “Interstate Killer.” These names came from his habit of leaving victims in isolated fields, wooded areas and abandoned properties near interstate highways and major rural roads.
Eyler frequently traveled between Chicago, Indianapolis and Terre Haute because of his work and personal relationships. This regular movement allowed him to approach victims in one city, transport them across county or state lines and abandon their bodies far from where they had last been seen. Investigators eventually connected numerous killings because the victims had similar injuries and were discovered in similar locations.
Method of Attack
Eyler generally targeted young men he met on streets, in bars, near bus stations or in areas where vulnerable teenagers and sex workers gathered. He reportedly offered some victims money, alcohol, drugs, transportation or a place to stay. Once a victim entered his vehicle, Eyler could drive him to a remote location where escape or outside assistance was unlikely.
Many victims were restrained with handcuffs, cords or other bindings. Several were gagged or blindfolded. Eyler commonly beat his victims and killed them with repeated knife wounds, particularly to the chest and abdomen. Some bodies were left partially undressed, and several were badly mutilated or dismembered. The repeated use of restraint, stabbing and roadside disposal helped police recognize that many apparently separate murders were probably connected.
Victims and Verified Dates
The following list contains identified victims whose dates of death or probable dates of death have been established through court records, investigations, autopsies, disappearances or Eyler’s confession. In cases where a body was discovered months later, the date listed is the accepted or estimated date of the killing rather than the discovery date.
- Steven Malcolm Crockett, 19 — October 23, 1982 — Kankakee County, Illinois. Crockett was abducted and murdered on October 23. His body was found in a cornfield approximately twelve hours later. He had been beaten and stabbed repeatedly.
- Edgar Anthony Underkofler, 26 — October 30, 1982 — Vermilion County, Illinois. Underkofler disappeared from Rantoul, Illinois, on October 30. His body was discovered on March 4, 1983, in a field near Danville. Investigators concluded that he had probably been killed shortly after disappearing.
- John R. Johnson, 25 — November 1982 — Lake County, Indiana. Johnson, sometimes identified in records as John Johnston, was killed during November 1982. His body was found on December 25 near Lowell, Indiana. The precise day of his death could not be established.
- William Joseph Lewis, 19 — November 20, 1982 — Jasper County, Indiana. Lewis was last seen hitchhiking near Vincennes on November 20. His remains were found near Rensselaer on October 15, 1983. He remained unidentified for decades before modern forensic genealogy confirmed his identity in 2021.
- Steven Ray Agan, 23 — December 19, 1982 — Vermillion County, Indiana. Agan was abducted in Terre Haute and taken to a rural property near Indiana State Road 63. His body was discovered on December 28. Eyler later admitted participating in the killing and was convicted of Agan’s murder in Indiana.
- John Lee Roach, 21 — December 22, 1982 — Putnam County, Indiana. Roach was killed several days before his body was discovered on December 28 in a field near Interstate 70. His injuries closely resembled those suffered by other victims attributed to Eyler.
- David M. Block, 22 — December 30, 1982 — Lake County, Illinois. Block disappeared at the end of December 1982. His skeletal remains were discovered on May 7, 1984, in a field near Lake Forest, Illinois.
- Ervin Dwayne Gibson, 16 — January 24, 1983 — Lake County, Illinois. Gibson disappeared on January 24. His remains were found on April 15 in a rural area outside Lake Forest. He was one of the youngest identified victims.
- John Daniel Bartlett, 19 — March 2, 1983 — Newton County, Indiana. Bartlett was killed in early March. His body was discovered on October 18 near an abandoned farmhouse outside Lake Village, Indiana, with several other victims.
- Michael Christopher Bauer, 22 — March 7, 1983 — Newton County, Indiana. Bauer was killed several days after Bartlett. His remains were also recovered in October near the abandoned Lake Village farmhouse.
- Richard Arthur Wayne Jr., 17 — March 20, 1983 — Hendricks County, Indiana. Wayne was killed in March, although his body was not discovered until December 7. He was found in a rural area near Belleville, Indiana.
- Gustavo Pineda Herrera, 26 — April 8, 1983 — Lake County, Illinois. Herrera’s body was discovered near Illinois Route 60 on the same day he was believed to have been killed. His injuries were similar to those found on other victims abandoned near Lake Forest.
- Jimmie T. Roberts, 18 — May 4, 1983 — Cook County, Illinois. Roberts was killed in early May. His body was recovered on May 9 in Cook County. Eyler later included Roberts among the victims in his confession.
- Daniel Scott McNeive, 21 — May 7, 1983 — Hendricks County, Indiana. McNeive was killed on May 7 and found two days later in a field near Indiana State Road 39. He had suffered numerous knife wounds, and the condition of his body immediately caused investigators to connect the case with other highway murders.
- Richard Edward Bruce Jr., 25 — May 18, 1983 — Effingham County, Illinois. Bruce was killed in May, but his body was not discovered until December 5 near Effingham. For years he was treated as an unidentified victim.
- John Ingram Brandenburg Jr., 19 — approximately May 29, 1983 — Newton County, Indiana. Brandenburg was one of four young men found near the Lake Village farmhouse in October. He remained unidentified until DNA testing and genetic genealogy confirmed his identity in 2021.
- Keith Lavell Bibbs, 16 — July 20, 1983 — Newton County, Indiana. Bibbs was also found near the Lake Village farmhouse. He remained unidentified for almost forty years before investigators announced his identity in 2023.
- Unidentified Hispanic male, approximately 20 to 25 — June 27 or June 28, 1983 — Ford County, Illinois. His body was found on July 2 in a field west of Paxton. He had been stabbed repeatedly and has not been conclusively identified.
- Ralph Ervin Calise, 28 — August 31, 1983 — Lake County, Illinois. Calise left his home late on August 30 and was found the following day in a field near Lake Forest. His murder became one of the central cases in the investigation that first led police directly to Eyler.
- Daniel H. “Danny” Bridges, 16 — August 19, 1984 — Chicago, Illinois. Bridges was taken to Eyler’s Rogers Park apartment on the night of August 19. He was killed and dismembered, and portions of his body were placed in refuse bags. A building employee discovered the remains in a nearby dumpster on August 21. Eyler was convicted of Bridges’s kidnapping and murder.
The Highway Murder Investigation
By 1983, police departments in Illinois and Indiana had begun comparing cases involving young male victims found near major roads. Investigators noticed repeated patterns: restraint marks, numerous stab wounds, missing clothing or personal property and disposal sites near highways. A coordinated task force was formed to share information across county and state boundaries.
Eyler attracted particular attention after the murder of Ralph Calise. Witnesses and records placed him in areas connected with several victims, and investigators found evidence in his vehicle that included handcuffs, knives, rope and drugs. Blood found on Eyler’s boots was linked to Calise. However, a judge later ruled that important evidence had been obtained through an unlawful search. The suppression of that evidence caused the murder charge against Eyler to collapse, and he was released from custody in February 1984.
The Murder of Daniel Bridges and Eyler’s Arrest
After his release, Eyler moved into an apartment on West Sherwin Avenue in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood. On August 19, 1984, he brought Daniel Bridges to the apartment. Two days later, a maintenance worker noticed Eyler placing heavy refuse bags into a dumpster. When the bags were examined, human remains were found inside.
Police searched Eyler’s apartment and discovered extensive blood evidence. Investigators determined that Bridges had been killed and dismembered inside the residence. Eyler was arrested on August 21, 1984. He was convicted of murder, aggravated kidnapping and concealing a homicidal death. On October 3, 1986, he was sentenced to death in Illinois.
Conviction for the Murder of Steven Agan
While awaiting execution, Eyler admitted his involvement in the murder of Steven Agan. He testified that Agan had been taken to an abandoned building near Terre Haute and killed there. Eyler accused his longtime associate Robert David Little of participating in the crime. Eyler was convicted of Agan’s murder in 1990 and received an additional sixty-year prison sentence.
Little was later tried for Agan’s murder but was acquitted. Eyler continued to accuse him of taking part in several killings. Because Eyler’s statements changed over time and Little was not convicted, the exact role of any accomplice remains disputed.
Confession and Death
Eyler spent the final years of his life at Pontiac Correctional Center in Illinois. During that period, he gave his attorney, Kathleen Zellner, detailed information about numerous unsolved murders. He offered to provide a complete confession in exchange for having his death sentence reduced to life imprisonment, but no agreement was reached.
Larry Eyler died from AIDS-related complications on March 6, 1994, at the age of forty-one. After his death, Zellner released a list of twenty-one killings to which he had confessed. The confession helped authorities connect victims found in different counties and provided information that contributed to later identifications. Eyler accepted responsibility for most of the murders but claimed that another person had physically killed Daniel Bridges, despite the evidence that led to his conviction.
Legacy of the Case
The Eyler investigation exposed serious problems caused by poor communication between police departments. His crimes crossed numerous jurisdictions, and individual agencies initially treated the murders as unrelated local cases. Only after investigators shared autopsy findings, witness reports and evidence did the full pattern become clear.
The case also demonstrates the continuing importance of identifying victims rather than remembering only the offender. Several young men remained nameless for decades after their bodies were discovered. Advances in DNA testing and forensic genealogy eventually restored the identities of William Lewis, John Brandenburg and Keith Bibbs. Other victims remain unidentified, and some suspected murders attributed to Eyler have never been conclusively proven.
