Leaders in Kansas City’s Black community say local police dismissed their worries that a serial killer was preying on young Black women until it was too late.
On 7 October, a 22-year-old Black woman escaped from a house in nearby Excelsior Springs, Missouri, where she said she was kidnapped, raped, whipped, and held in shackles for days by a man who killed two of her friends, according to Black news site The Kansas City Defender. Her name has not been released to protect her privacy.
Police arrested Timothy Haslett, Jr, a 39-year-old white man, the same day. He has been charged with first-degree rape, first-degree kidnapping, and second-degree assault, to which he has pleaded not guilty.
Local leaders say the woman, described in police documents with the initials TJ, was put in harm’s way because the police didn’t their claims seriously.
In September, the Defender posted a video warning of a Kansas City killer targetting Black women in the area of Prospect Avenue. It went viral, racking up nearly 70,000 retweets and more than 105,000 likes on various platforms.
At the time, police called the claims “completedly unfounded.”
“There is no basis to support this rumor,” the KCPD told the Kansas City Star.
Bishop Tony Caldwell, whose warnings formed the basis of the Defender video, told the site on Friday that the police had failed.
“We get a lot of information because we’re right on the street level, he said. “A lot of times we are even trying to give the police information so they can act on it, because the people in the street don’t trust them and now we can see that’s rightfully so.”
“The families are heartbroken and now they are even more mad. Because something could have been done back then,” he added. “There’s a possibility their loved ones could have been saved if folks would have acted back when our community was first making these reports, instead of waiting for the young lady to escape.”
The Kansas City police have stood by their previous denunciation, arguing that at the time the allegations were made, there was no evidence of a serial killer on the loose.
TJ’s horrific claims against Timothy Haslett may only be the beginning.
Per arrest documents, the 39-year-old allegedly kept TJ in a basement room that he built, holding her chained in handcuffs on her wrists and ankles. She showed injuries on her back consistent with someone who was whipped.
Police say she managed to escape when her captor left to drop his son off for school, and neighbours found her barefoot, wearing latex lingerie and a hommade padlock, with duct tape around her mouth.
“I could see immediately she was in desperate trouble – she looked like something out of a horror movie,” Lisa Johnson, who found TJ on her front steps, told the Daily Mail.
The terrorised woman told police she had been picked up in September in the area around Prospect Avenue, the same time frame and location figures like Bishop Caldwell had been warning police about. She also said she’d been picked up with two friends, who she claims Timothy Haslett killed.
Police are now investigating whether there are more victims.
In the last year, police had visited his rental home three times -- twice on welfare checks at the behest of his father and a coworker, and a third time in July of 2022 on an animal control call.
Timothy Haslett is slated to appear in court on 18 October for a bond hearing.
Notably, This isn’t the first allegation of racism against the KCPD. In September, the Justice Department announced it was investigating the agency over allegations Black officers were called slurs, discriminated against in hiring, and disciplined excessively.
