Crimes and Incidents
The Freetown State Forest has been the location of several crimes and incidents. Due to these events, the forest has become associated with the so-called "Bridgewater Triangle."
In November, 1978, the body of Mary Lou Arruda, a 15-year-old cheerleader abducted from Raynham, Massachusetts that September, was discovered tied to a tree in the state forest. James M. Kater of Brockton, previously convicted of kidnapping in 1967, was convicted of the kidnapping and murder of Arruda in 1979. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court overturned the verdict, and he was convicted again in 1986. The verdict once again overturned; he was retried in 1992, with that attempt ending in a mistrial.
In 1980, while investigating another local murder, police had been approached by individuals who claimed to have witnessed Satanic cult activity within the state forest. These reports would have bearing on the fourth Kater trial (1996–2000) which ended with the conviction upheld. In the 1996 trial, the defense charged that police had withheld information relating to the alleged Satanic cult activity, which it claimed could have provided an alternative to Kater.
Three more murders were subsequently related to the state forest. In 1987 a transient drifter mistaken for an undercover police officer was murdered in the forest, and in 2001 two men were found shot to death on Bell Rock Road, which runs through the forest connecting Assonet and Fall River. Two assaults were also reported: a Fall River man in 1991 and a teenager from New Bedford in 1998.
Other incidents include hazardous waste dumping (1996), reports of aggressive abandoned dogs (2006), and reports of an escaped emu wandering the forest (2006).
Read more about this topic: Freetown-Fall River State Forest
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