Josefina
On Thanksgiving 1986, 25-year-old Josefina Rivera was working the streets, trying to earn enough money to put dinner on the table for her estranged children. Before she left that night, she and her boyfriend had a big fight, which ended with Josefina walking out of her apartment in an impoverished area of north Philadelphia.
Josefina found herself getting into a white Cadillac, with Gary Heidnik behind the wheel. Shortly after he had paid her for services she’d performed, the pair went to a local McDonalds, where Heidnik bought himself a coffee.
When they left, Heidnik told her they were both going back to his house and Josefina got back in the car. When they arrived at his home on North Marshall Street, she noticed the strange key Heidnik used on his front door. The key had been cut into two pieces, with the ridged end of the key already in the lock. In order to access the house, the other part of the key was needed. A strange safety mechanism that would work later in Heidnik’s dreadful story.
The interior of the house was just as bizarre. Pennies were glued to the walls and the upstairs hallway had been covered in $5 bills. What little furniture he had was old and broken, with only a television and tape player being in any working order.
They concluded their business in the main bedroom, and when Josefina got up to put her clothes back on, Heidnik grabbed her neck from behind and began to choke her. She begged him to stop but instead, he handcuffed her wrists and pushed her down the stairs to the basement, where he left her.
When Heidnik returned, he carried a spade and other digging equipment and began to make a hole in the floor of the basement. He told Josefina that he planned to grow his family and he wanted to capture ten women for his “harem”.
Josefina tried to escape soon after and managed to lift herself halfway through a small window in the basement, but her screams were only answered by Gary Heidnik. He brought a radio from upstairs and tuned it to hard rock music at full volume, in case his captive tried to scream again. Cold and alone, Josefina made note of the hours that passed until her captor returned. He returned 27 hours later and this time he had company.
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