Richard Keiper has built a life in Boyd, Texas. The Facebook photos posted by his wife show him at birthday parties and family gatherings often cradling his granddaughter with the awkward caution of someone not quite accustomed to caring for a creature so small.
The 67-year-old doesn't look the part of a murderer, yet that's how police describe him. Forty-five years ago in his native Pennsylvania, they say he killed a man in cold blood and stole his 1969 Ford Thunderbird and clothes. He finally confessed to the murder last month during an interview with Texas Rangers, according to The Associated Press.
Keiper became a suspect three years into the murder investigation after a witness came forward and told police that Keiper had approached him at a bar and tried to sell him a gun he'd used to shoot a guy from Bethlehem Steel, where the victim had worked.
By then, Keiper had fled Pennsylvania with the intention of joining the carnival and starting a new life, and the case went cold. Recently, a Pennsylvania state trooper began looking into the case and decided to try and track Keiper down.
Keiper was arrested at his job at a wastewater treatment plant. He's being held at the Wise County jail.
