Larry Eyler

Larry William Eyler (December 21, 1952 – March 6, 1994) was an American serial killer who is believed to have murdered a minimum of twenty-one teenage boys and young men in a series of killings committed in the Midwest between 1982 and 1984.

Larry Eyler was born on December 21, 1952, in Crawfordsville, Indiana, the youngest of four children born to George Howard Eyler (September 19, 1924 – September 25, 1971) and Shirley Phyllis ( Kennedy, later DeKoff; April 22, 1928 – June 8, 2016).

His father was an alcoholic who is known to have physically and emotionally abused his wife and children.

Eyler's parents divorced in mid-1955, and he and his sister were regularly placed in the care of babysitters, foster families, or simply left in the care of their two older siblings (the oldest of whom was aged ten) as their mother struggled to financially support and provide adequate care for four children, working two jobs as a waitress and in a factory on weekdays, and occasionally in a bar at weekends.

Nonetheless, when Eyler and his sister were in the care of foster families, their mother would frequently visit her two youngest children, and Eyler would claim these separations and reunions brought the family closer.

In 1957, Eyler's mother remarried.

This marriage lasted one year before the couple divorced.

His mother married for a third time in 1960, although the couple divorced four years later.

Due to his increasing stubbornness and erratic behavior, Eyler's mother placed him in a home for unruly boys in 1963.

He found this experience emotionally devastating, and within weeks had tearfully persuaded his mother to allow him to return home.

Shortly thereafter, Eyler underwent psychological tests which revealed him to be of average intelligence, although suffering from severe insecurity and holding an extreme fear of separation and abandonment.

Deducing these fears sourced from his home life, staff recommended Eyler be temporarily placed in a Catholic boys' home in Fort Wayne.

He remained at this residence for six months before he returned to the care of his mother.

When he reached puberty, Eyler discovered he was homosexual.

He was open about his sexuality only to his family, although he struggled with deep-seated feelings of self-hatred regarding his sexual orientation.

Throughout high school, he occasionally dated girls, although none of these relationships became physical.

Having been somewhat religious since childhood, Eyler did confide to some close acquaintances how he struggled to accept his sexuality.

In part due to his lackadaisical attitude towards schooling, Eyler failed to graduate from high school, although he did later obtain a General Educational Development certificate.

Shortly after leaving college, Eyler obtained employment as a private security guard in the Marion County General Hospital.

He worked in this employment for six months before losing this position and finding alternate work within a shoe store.

While in this employment, Eyler began familiarizing himself with Indianapolis's gay community, frequenting gay bars and frequently engaging in casual liaisons with men.

Several of these individuals noted Eyler averted his eyes from his partner during intercourse while shouting profanities such as bitch and whore, leading many to believe Eyler was fantasizing his partner was female.

By the mid-1970s, Eyler was well-known within the gay community of Indianapolis—particularly among those with a leather fetish.

Several acquaintances within this community described him as a good-looking, "laid-back guy" and avid bodybuilder who was close to his mother and sister, although others who had engaged in sexual activity with him described him as an individual with a sadistic streak and violent temper which would only surface within their sexual encounters, often involving Eyler extensively bludgeoning, then inflicting light knife wounds upon unwilling partners—particularly to their torsos.

Eyler primarily worked as a house painter, and although never having served in the military, he was fond of wearing Marine Corps T-shirts.

She married for the fourth time in 1972.

Eyler's father and his first two stepfathers drank heavily, and he and his siblings were subjected to frequent abuse, with one of his stepfathers frequently holding Eyler's head beneath scalding water as a form of discipline.

Eyler attended St. Joseph School in Lebanon, Indiana.

Although tall for his age and active in sporting activities, he was regularly targeted by bullies due to his being from a poor family and his parents' divorce, frequently leading to his sister, Theresa, confronting her brother's tormentors.

Eyler was viewed by teachers as a quiet yet likable pupil, with few friends.

He resided in a condominium in Terre Haute with a 38-year-old library science professor named Robert David Little, whom he had first met in 1974 while studying at the Indiana State University.

The relationship between the two men was a platonic one, with Eyler viewing Little as something of a father figure.

Eyler and Little regularly socialized within Indianapolis's gay community, although Little—a socially awkward, taciturn and unattractive individual—typically struggled to form friendships or obtain sexual partners during these excursions, resulting in Eyler frequently bringing young men to Little's home to engage in sex with the two.

On August 3, 1978, Eyler picked up a 19-year-old hitchhiker named Craig Long on 7th Street in Terre Haute.

Shortly after Long entered the pickup truck, Eyler propositioned the youth, resulting in Long attempting to leave the vehicle.

Convicted and sentenced to death by lethal injection for the 1984 kidnapping and murder of 16-year-old Daniel Bridges, he later voluntarily confessed to the 1982 murder of 23-year-old Steven Agan, offering to also confess to his culpability in twenty further unsolved homicides if the state of Illinois would commute his sentence to life imprisonment without parole.

Eyler died of AIDS-related complications in 1994 while incarcerated on death row.

Shortly before his death, he confessed to the murders of twenty further young men and boys to his defense attorney Kathleen Zellner, although he denied being physically responsible for the actual murder of Bridges, which he insisted had been committed by an alleged accomplice in five of his homicides, Robert David Little.

With her client's consent, Zellner posthumously released Eyler's confession following the formal announcement of his death.

Eyler was known as the Interstate Killer and the Highway Killer due to the fact many of his confirmed and alleged victims were discovered across several midwestern states in locations close to or accessible via the Interstate Highway System.