John Emil List was a man of faith. He read the Bible daily, taught Sunday school and prayed often. He did everything he could to shelter his wife and three children within the Lutheran faith. Though he failed, it is the way he dealt with his failure for which he will be remembered.
John's mother had been a hatmaker and part-time nurse. When her widowed cousin fell ill, she nursed him back to health, and they eventually married. At the time she was 40, he was 20 years her senior. She bore one child, John, whom she named after the disciple that Jesus loved. Her husband ignored the child, who stuck close to his mother. John was obsessively obedient, excelled in Luther's small catechism, and was aptly branded a sissy and a mama's boy. The watchword of the List household was "restraint"; voices were never raised, emotions never shown, charity never accepted, and problems never shared. He served his country during World War Two in the Pacific and European theaters and was held briefly as a German prisoner of war.
Helen List, John's wife, had been abused as a child. She first married at 16, bore two children - one of which died at six months, and suffered a miscarriage. Before her husband left to die in World War Two he gave Helen syphilis. Because penicillin was reserved for the military, doctors tried to cure her by infecting her with malaria. It didn't work. By managing her disease she prevented her children and husband from contracting it. But over the course of her life, her denial of the disease caused it to leave her nearly blind, demented and unable to walk. She comforted herself with alcohol.
When John met Helen it was the first time the 26-year old man had been intimate with a woman. She quickly became pregnant and John, agonizing over the decision, vowed to marry her. The day before the wedding Helen announced that she had been wrong about the pregnancy, but they went through with the ceremony, against John's better judgement.
John supported his family as an accountant. He was promoted regularly and eventually accepted a vice-presidency for a firm in New Jersey. Though far beyond their means the family bought an 18-room mansion and moved John's mother Alma to the third floor apartment. The house was magnificent, the crown jewel being a beautiful ballroom with a lead glass ceiling The Lists, however, could never afford to properly furnish or heat the sprawling home and footsteps echoed through the lonely halls. John became active in the local Lutheran church, becoming a Sunday School teacher. Helen, whose condition was worsening, kept to herself and drank. The family rarely socialized.
The Lists lived in the house for six years. The children involved themselves in school, but showed little interest in church. John's oldest daughter, Patty, was active in the theater department, smoked dope and dabbled in witchcraft. John lost his job as vice president and eventually ended up selling life insurance. This kept the family afloat for awhile, but as bills continued to pile up the three mortgages John had taken on the house remained unpaid. John's client list dried up and he was left unemployed, brooding in the cavernous house.
John List was desperate. After weighing his options he felt that only one was viable. On November 11, 1971, alone with Helen at the breakfast table, he shot her in the head. Then he went upstairs and shot his mother in the head. Back downstairs he dragged Helen's body by her feet on a sleeping bag to the ballroom. In the process her nightgown rode up her legs, exposing her sex. John didn't bother to pull it down, but did put a rag over Helen's face. His mother was later discoverd upstairs, similarly displayed. Then he cleaned up the blood and ate breakfast. In the afternoon he picked up Patty, brought her home and shot her in the head, dragging her on a sleeping bag into the ballroom. Then he picked up his younger son, repeated the process and waited for his older son to return from school. When he was finished shooting the last child, several times due to his struggling, he attended to personal affairs, ate dinner and went to bed. The next morning he disappeared - not to be found for 18 years. The bodies of his family would not be discovered for a month.
John had originally considered killing himself, but he didn't want to leave his children destitute and alone with a dying and demented mother. And suicide was a sin which would bar him from Heaven. Backruptcy and welfare were options too humiliating to consider. He was certain it would drive his wife and children even further from a life of faith. The only way he could solve his problems AND insure heaven for his family was to kill them. He knew, from John 3:16, that God would forgive him.
After leaving town John took the alias Robert P. Clark and worked a series of professional jobs in several states. He married a woman named Delores and they bought a house. The FBI finally caught up with John through an anonymous tip offered by a someone who'd seen a photograph of List on "America's Most Wanted." John Emil List was convicted of the murders and remains in prison.
Shortly after the murders the mansion mysteriously burned down. Ironically, the glass ceiling in the ballroom was a signed Tiffany original worth about $100,000 at the time. Had John sold the ceiling he could have paid off the mortgages and been left with a modest income. Instead, it shattered in the fire.
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