Terry Lloyd Caspersen was born in Minnesota, possibly Duluth. His family seemed to move back and forth between there and Wausau, Wisconsin.
In early 1963, Caspersen was at the Winnebago State Hospital to undergo mental health testing after a suicide attempt. He was released after 10 weeks. While out in June 1963, he was arrested for stealing a truck and put on three years probation later that year. We will return to this later.
Fast forward. The stabbing of 18-year old Eleanor Kaatz occurred May 11, 1964 on Barker-Stewart Island in Wausau. Caspersen was 21. Kaatz was stabbed nearly 50 times while on her way to afternoon classes. She was initially found alive near the Wisconsin River, her gingham dress ripped and soaked in blood. Six of the stab wounds punctured her liver, doctors said.
Caspersen was captured after a chase one day after the attack. Kaatz was able to identify him from a collection of photos the police showed her. He was held for attempted murder on $25,000 bond with a preliminary hearing set for May 27. Caspersen confessed, saying he was considering suicide but then saw Kaatz and changed his mind. Marathon County District Attorney Patrick L. Crooks told reporters Caspersen signed a statement admitting the attack and said he “didn’t know why he did it.” Crooks said he described the attack in detail, telling prosecutors he seized the girl, dragged her in to the brush and then thought Kaatz had recognized him. That, he said, was what prompted him to stab her.
Caspersen also admitted to setting hundreds of fires while in Duluth, Minnesota. Unexplained fires had terrorized residents on the west side of Duluth over a four year period.
Two days after the stabbing, Kaatz died of her injuries at St. Mary’s Hospital in Wausau. Caspersen learned of the young woman’s death while listening to the radio in his cell block. The murder made headlines statewide and shocked residents in Wausau, who struggled to understand why a man would attack a stranger.
On May 13, the same day Eleanor Kaatz died, Caspersen was visited in the Wausau jail by Sheriff Lowell and Lt. Richard Guenther of Winnebago County and Sheriff Calvin Spice and Lt. Zuelske of Outagamie County. Caspersen told them that in June 1963 he was on leave from the Oshkosh asylum and was picked up by his parents in their blue Plymouth station wagon. He said while on leave he did odd jobs for the Holiday Inn, and that was how he spent his time. His friends at the time were Steven Nagler and Warren Dorow and they could back him up. He said he didn’t attend any weddings or birthday parties while on leave. The police explained that the Wayne Pratt murder occurred while he was on leave and it was interesting he had been at the Oshkosh asylum and the truck he later stole was in Winnebago County. Caspersen denied that he had ever been to Pratt’s service station and said he had heard about it when he returned to the asylum, but only because everyone was talking about it. Caspersen offered to take a polygraph test, but he wasn’t given one.
May 15, Lt. Guenther interviewed Erhard Vogel at the Storm Milk Company in Manawa where he worked. Vogel had stolen the truck with Caspersen the last year. He said inside the truck they had a screwdriver and a knife, and Vogel said he feared Caspersen because he would often talk crazy. Guenther asked for an example. Vogel said that Caspersen told him he did not believe in religion and felt that when you died, you were just dead. He said he had a “golden hand” and if he wanted to, all he had to do was touch someone and they would die. Caspersen told Vogel he was a genius and did not like to eat animals because they were intelligent just like people. After being arrested, Vogel was again afraid of Caspersen because he kept saying he would kill himself and take someone else with him.
July 5, Erhard Vogel was interviewed again, this time by Officer Wilbur Fuller at the state hospital. He went into more detail this time, saying he was playing baseball with Caspersen, John Olson and a man named Casey at the Oshkosh asylum on June 26, 1963 when they decided to just walk away. They walked down a road until they found a farm with a truck outside. The keys were in the truck, so Caspersen started it up and Vogel joined him. The others did not go. They had considered hitchhiking to Kansas, but now Caspersen wanted to go to Minnesota. They got gas in Menasha and took Highway 10 west to Alma (on the state border). They then lit the truck on fire and pushed it down a hill. The pair hitchhiked to Red Wing, Minnesota and turned themselves in because they were bored and sick of walking. Vogel told Fuller he was happy to clear his conscience and hoped he could pay for the truck.
After being charged with Kaatz’s murder, Caspersen initially pleaded insanity. Caspersen was ruled competent to stand trial. He was defended by Norman Baguhn, a court-appointed attorney. At trial on September 15, Dr. George Andrews testified that Caspersen was a “sociopathic personality with schizophrenic tendencies.” Despite this, the doctor said Caspersen understood right from wrong and was legally sane.
The jury was out for about an hour and found him guilty. Caspersen visibly broke into tears. He was convicted and sentenced to life. At his sentencing, Kaatz’s own parents said they felt sorry for him and his family. Defense attorney Baguhn requested Caspersen’s file be sent to Waupun so they were aware of his mental health issues and could transfer him to the Central State Hospital if necessary. Judge Gerald Boileau agreed.
April 18, 1977, walked away from a prison camp in Lake Tomahawk, Oneida County, and caught April 22 in Trempeleau County, hundreds of miles away.
He would serve a total of 17 years before he was paroled in September 1981. On December 19, he threatened a Rhinelander woman, 23-year old Marie Lohr, with sexual assault. He kidnapped her from a parking lot in Pelican (Oneida County) and cut her throat before police arrested him. She survived.
In April 1982, he was sentenced to 57 years and ordered to register as a sex offender. Since the crime was committed while he was on parole, his life sentence also resumed. In December 1982, Marie Lohr sued Oneida County Sheriff Penny Drivas, saying police did not respond while she was being attacked and struggled “for some time” while in the parking lot before being forced into a car.
Terry Caspersen, 80, died on May 19, 2023. In 2024, a DNA match identified a suspect in the 1963 murder of Wayne Pratt in Neenah. Authorities at first declined to name the suspect until family members could be notified, but they told the press it was someone previously on their radar on who had died a little over a year prior. Neenah News (a local newspaper) broke the story, and named Caspersen as someone who matched this description.
It wasn’t him.