For the first time the public will see the horrific drawings John Joubert made while on death row. Former KMTV Anchor Mark Pettit will close the book on the metro's most notorious serial child.
Pettit is reissuing his book “A Need to Kill: The Death Row Drawings” that experts say proves Joubert would've killed again.
Joubert was a boy scout and an airman at Offutt Air Force Base when he murdered Danny Joe Eberle and Christopher Walden in 1983 in Bellevue and Papillion. He stripped the boys, tied their arms and legs, and stabbed them to death. Joubert pleaded guilty to the crimes and was executed in 1996.
While on death row in 1987, Joubert told Pettit he fantasized about killing more kids and made drawings. The serial killer signed the sketches over to Pettit, but the prison refused to turn them over.
Pettit won a lawsuit in 2013 to obtain them, but the Nebraska Supreme Court overturned the decision. During that time a confidential source sent Pettit a copy of the drawings so they could be analyzed.
Pettit had worked for 30 years to obtain the sketches.
"The scary part here was that he was fantasizing to perfect the act of murder if he ever had the chance to do it again and the profiler says there is no lingering doubt that he would've committed murder again if by some chance he had ever been released from prison," Pettit explained.
The two drawings depict a man stabbing a young boy who's bound without a blindfold. The other shows another boy tied up but without hands and feet.
“He was a sexual sadist, an organized offender, and a pedophile,” said criminal behavior expert Keith Howard.
The book also discusses a little known fact that Joubert was interviewed several times by the FBI and believed he could cut a deal and get out of prison.
Sarpy County Attorney Lee Polikov was an investigator in the Joubert case, and wanted to see the drawings released so people can better understand the mind of a sadistic killer.
"I think we have an obligation to help people understand what goes on and why it goes on and the fact that it really does happen," Polikov explained.
The Nebraska Department of Corrections did not make a representative available for an interview, and instead referred KMTV to the NE Supreme Court decision denying the drawings.
The new edition of "A Need to Kill: The Death Row Drawings" is available at: https://www.createspace.com/6722997
It will also be on Amazon soon.
