On the 11th Nightmare Before Christmas...

On a sunny November morning in 1971, best friends Debbie Ackerman and Maria Johnson, both just 15, set out for a day of surfing near Galveston, Texas. The two girls were inseparable—bonded by their shared love of the beach, the waves, and the promise of youth. Maria, a newcomer to Galveston, had already endured a turbulent childhood. After her parents split, she bounced between homes and schools before settling into Ball High School. Shy but friendly, she quickly found her place. She loved water skiing, dated a local ski jumper, and spent her weekends at the beach.

Debbie, by contrast, was a lifelong islander, what locals called a BOI (“born on the island”). With one brown eye and one blue-green eye, she stood out immediately. She was bold, competitive, and passionate about water sports, often making the local news for her water skiing competitions. Surfing was her favorite pastime, and her friends remembered her as fun, magnetic, and endlessly outgoing.

That Sunday, November 14, they planned a short trip to Houston, just over an hour’s drive away, to spend the day exploring. Since neither girl had a car, they decided to hitchhike, a common and almost carefree practice in the early 1970s. Witnesses later reported seeing them outside a Baskin-Robbins near Stewart Beach, laughing and chatting as they bought ice cream. A white van pulled up to the curb. The driver asked where they were headed. “Houston,” one of the girls said. It was his route, he told them. They climbed in.

They were never seen alive again.

Join Cam and Jen on this episode of Our True Crime Podcast entitled: The Eleven Who Went To Heaven: Edward Bell."

Thank you to our incredible team:

Listener discretion by Edward October @octoberpodVHS.

Executive Producer/Music by @theinkypawprint.

Sources: 

https://law.justia.com/cases/texas/tenth-court-of-appeals/1994/1036.html

https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-news-journal-1979-tx-edward-ha/37438275/

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/37438275/1979-tx-edward-harold-bell-convicted-of/

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80125091/edward-bell/

https://www.dallasnews.com/arts-entertainment/tv/2023/10/03/how-a-shirtless-matthew-mcconaughey-got-his-first-credit-on-unsolved-mysteries-in-1992/

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5511750/the-waco-citizen/

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/82998028/ed-bell-69-exposure-to-13-year-old/

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0737501/

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80125009/edward-bell/

https://archive.today/20211228093122/https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/2017/10/18/243184/investigators-think-they-know-who-killed-eleven-girls-around-galveston-in-the-1970s-2/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Harold_Bell
https://archive.ph/20131014191511/http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Confessions-of-a-cold-blooded-killer-2187501.php#selection-4701.0-5149.1
https://archive.ph/20190823045333/https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Texas-killer-s-death-leaves-unanswered-13783107.php

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