Here’s an interesting “cartoon” by “Joe Tazelaar” in The Grand Rapids Press, August 8, 1959. “Sigsbee SE” is a street in Grand Rapids.
Tazelaar was a dedicated choral singer who spent the last 30 years of his life with the Fort Street Presbyterian Chorale in Detroit. Perhaps he spent time at Interlochen pursuing his singing talent when he was much younger.
He graduated from U of M and pursued a teaching career. In 1965 he was a counselor for the Hi-Y program, open to all young men from Muskegon High School. The program was based on “clean living.”
And from February 10, 1970:
In February 1977, Tazelaar was arrested on charges of criminal sexual conduct with four 13-year-old boys he knew in connection with his ties to the St. Clair Wilderness Campgrounds.
He was arrested by MSP Det/Sgt Joel Gorzen, who was the investigator on the Shelden/Richards/N. Fox Island allegations some 18 months earlier. Gorzen knew all about these men. These types. Gorzen was in communication with convicted pedophile and Frank Shelden associate Gerald Richards during his incarceration, as well as with reporter Marilyn Wright of the Traverse City Record-Eagle. Wright wrote extensively about the monstrous N. Fox Island and Shelden, Richards, Grossman and Starchild (McConahy).
There is no stand-alone obituary online for Joel Gorzen, but it appears from postings on Facebook that he may have died in 2022. That none of the investigators on the OCCK task force post-2005 spoke live to Gorzen is unbelievable. Gorzen knew what was up. I bet he knew why the dogs got called off of Shelden, Richards, Grossman, Starchild and Busch.
Records from Tazelaar’s 1977 preliminary hearings confirmed he was indigent and he was held in state custody from February 2 to April 19, 1977. Therefore he could not have participated in any of the steps taken in my brother’s abduction and murder. He was ruled out as the OCCK (because of course the cops wanted to believe this was a solo crime by one deranged maniac). Any suspect who had an alibi for one of the four murders was good to go.
Here’s how the internet describes Tazelaar’s treatment in what was a regional investigation of child exploitation: “Unlike other major targets of that specific regional investigation—some of whom received life sentences—Tazelaar was not handed a lengthy prison term. Following his legal entanglements in the late 1970s, he lived as a free citizen in Metro Detroit for the remainder of his life.” He sung it up in the church choir and was a resident of Royal Oak until he died in March 2022.
In the wake of the 2006 arrests of pedophiles Ted Lamborgine and Richard Lawson, Detective Cory Williams circled back to Joe Tazelaar and his brother Willem, a long, longtime resident of Birmingham who lived with his family less than a mile from our family. They didn’t say jackshit, and lawyered up. Their pal former Sen. Jack Faxon died in 2020, but no one ever asked him anything about his days running with the Tazelaars. I’m sure it was all just good fun.
While we can’t tarnish others based on mere association with JT, this brief newspaper scrapbook on him (thank you to a reader) shows he used all the goddamn plays from the Book of Pedos. He didn’t have a fraction of the assets or power some of the other “players” from Oakland County had, but he got the easy treatment. Maybe he cleaned up his act after he got busted in February 1977. What are the odds?
Wayne County was an especially easy place to be a pedophile in the 1970s. Oakland County appears to have been even easier.
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He may have been ruled out as the OCCK, but I would bet anything that he went to his grave knowing exactly who was.
Yep. That 1977 arrest and brief stint in jail was a “keep your mouth shut” deal.
I’ll bet there are a lot of men in their 60s-70s who are victims of this monster. I feel so bad for all of them.
I wish it was possible to find out who he was living with and hanging out with in Grosse Pointe. I think I saw an article or a post about him singing at St Paul. Maybe on this blog. I should change my handle to “I’m new here,” while I catch up and comment with info everyone else knew years ago.
I think about you and all the families all the time.
I’m so sorry this page has to exist.
I submit that you are finding some very useful and relevant information. Certainly more than all the many detectives assigned to this case since Cory retired. They have contributed nothing.
I too would like to know more about his Grosse Pointe connections. A couple of connections could be:
1) Michael Larimer – Associate of Josiah and Willem Tazelaar. Tip called in on Larimer by D/Sgt Joel Gorzen (MSP) who was investigating Frank Shelden and Gerald Richards. The tip states that Larimer was a subject that wanted to take child prostitutes from the 6 Mile and Woodward corridor to New York to prostitute them.
2) Ken Collinson – Real name Lyle Kenneth Collinson. Associate of Josiah Tazelaar at the 88 Stevens home in Highland Park. He too resided a long time in Grosse Pointe. He sang at the Fort Street Chorale just like Tazelaar. He also attended many Opera events like Tazelaar. He also has some connection to Dr. Robert Sillery, the Oakland County Medical Examiner. Sillery’s family also liveed in Grosse Pointe. When Sillery’s wife passed away, Collinson wrote a tribute to her.
https://www.verheyden.org/obituaries/Suzanne-A-Achouline?obId=28393118
He waited 8 years after her death, but apparently she was important enough to him to pay homage twice. It appears she also attended the Michigan Opera Theatre, and Detroit Symphony Orchestra events. No doubt this may be how she was associated with Collinson, possibly Tazelaar, and who knows who else. Coincidentally, her service was at Joann Matouk’s church, 5 years after her “suicide”.
G- Man, I will look into all the names you just listed. My turnaround time varies from a few days to weeks. Life stuff pops up. Good life stuff. I am not complaining. : )
And yeah, that “suicide.” My tinfoil hat makes be think some stuff with that horrible case overlaps with the OCCK. There are a couple of people who make me go “hmmmm.” Those people have no public record of anything. Those people are not the same people who have been in the news or have their names towed behind planes over GP during the spring/summer months. Only my red flag radar goes off, is all.
G-Man, could Michael be his street name and his government name be Melvin?
I got a Melvin in 1984 who ticks off all the boxes including Interlochen and choir. And Traverse City.
Anything is possible. Nobody ever tried investigating him except Cory (see his 10-19-2007 notes).
Thank you. I’ll go check the notes and see if there’s any other clues for this guy beyond the name.
Hang on to your hat, this is some wild stuff. I think Michael Larimer is now a woman or is using a woman’s name (just like Det. Williams’ notes mention) I think when Det. Williams called Michael Larimer in Novi in 2007 or 08 and a woman answered, or a woman said “no it’s not me,” it really was the right one.
But! I’m still checking a few things out to see if I’m wrong. I kinda wanna be wrong.
Maybe it is a stolen identity situation.
Yes I read that also. But there is nothing beyond that. Another lead not pursued because there was no place to go with it. But you caught on how many middle names or nicknames were used by many of these men.
Yeah and I found her in Florida now.
Found her in Florida as in active on Facebook. She was sued (with a bunch of other people) by the City of Novi using a misspelled name (a variation of the ones she uses) bc it’s listed that way on the property records.
And all of that on its own is wild because I can’t do anything without an exact name on my DL or passport which had better match or else I can’t even get on a flight.
And this old lady is a monster (allegedly). That’s the big thing that blows my mind.
If not Mel, I have a Michael in 1976 playing guitar in the Flint Symphony Orchestra. I can keep on the Michael name in the meantime.
He was a member of Fort Street Presbyterian Chorale for many years, but his obituary also states that he sang with other choirs including St. Paul Cathedral in Grosse Pointe. Many affluent people in Grosse Pointe attended this church over the years, and it was the scene of the Joann Matouk “suicide”
The February 1977 article also confirms he resided in Grosse Pointe. However I find it hard to believe that someone who resided near Birmingham, in Grosse Pointe, had a house in Highland Park while he rented an apartment in Royal Oak could be considered indigent.
Excellent point, G-Man. I think in hindsight it is very obvious that Tazelaar was getting a pass as part of the protect Shelden and especially his “clients” program.
No doubt on the protection he was receiving.
The article indicates that the judge continued bond at $5,000. I would read this as he was let out on bond. Yet you stated;, “Records from Tazelaar’s 1977 preliminary hearings confirmed he was indigent and he was held in state custody from February 2 to April 19, 1977.”
Do you have these records? I also notice the timing of these records (February 2 to April 19, 1977) coincides with what was happening in Flint with the Busch/Greene arrest as described in Guarded By Jackals.
Sorry, G-Man, I do not have any records from Tazelaar’s case–that was the answer I got when I ran multiple AI searches. I should have specified that. But Feb.2, 1977 is dangerously close the the Greene/Busch arrests the last week of January. February 1 was Greene’s fourth polygraph before bid him adieu.
Busch would be protected, but Greene truly was indigent and as described in Guarded by Jackals, Patterson and Thompson would do everything in their power to make sure there were no more links between those two pedophiles in the press or in the courtroom. Greene gets locked up for life and his attempts to meet with Flint PD Officer Waldren over the next few years to discuss Chris Busch and other information are summarily shut down by Waldren’s boss. Greene’s pro se appeal (basically arguing he was told it would not be a life sentence if he pleaded guilty) was rejected.
They couldn’t pull a Greg Greene on the U of M educated Josiah Tazelaar, but I’m guessing CSC charges involve FOUR 13-year-old boys didn’t just evaporate for lack of evidence.
I have the Tazelaar documents, prelim and pleadings. So does Marney, I sent her a copy of mine long ago. It’s legit, the dates and duration of his incarceration are documented in Motions to Reduce Bond filed by his lawyer. They are part of the court proceedings and are incorporated into those two documents. He was in jail, alright.
Thanks. I appreciate the corroboration of this information. It also aligns with what others told Cory in his investigation. They also said Tazelaar spent a year or so in jail. I’d be interested in knowing his exact dates of incarceration, and the lawyer(s) he used. I don’t recall any of these document being posted on this blog. Perhaps that is a possibility.
Bob K
Joel Gorzen was the first one to suspect that the N. Fox Island gang he was investigating might be involved with the murder of Mark Stebbins (1976). As such, he requested and received the anal swab taken from Mark. Unfortunately, this was lost along with Gerald Richards client list in one of those pesky floods that always seem to occur when the authorities want that type of evidence to disappear. Wouldn’t it be nice to have that considering the major advances in DNA analysis that have been made.
If we could only know who pulled these strings to protect these monsters. Who was responsible for calling off the dogs. Was it the CIA? L. Brooks Patterson? The law enforcement who knew this was wrong and played ball anyway. Those who knew right from wrong had a lot to live with after this.
When the game gets played this way new monsters fill the vacuum. Nothing changes. These ham-handed fucks did just enough damage to the evidence and spun enough of “nothing more could have been done, it is such a tough case!” tale that the investigation was essentially derailed before it even got off the ground. It is the most shameful history in Michigan law enforcement in the most heinous serial murders. That’s you, Oakland County. Name one other serial murder case in Michigan where the victims were held captive for days or weeks before being murdered and dumped in public. If you know you are going to die at the hands of monsters, would you rather go quickly or spend 19 days warming up to the idea that you are never going to see your family again?
Those evidence room floods aren’t just ‘convenient’ for “authorities”. They also provide a perfect pretext for lying about all kinds of documents, that someone “knows” had existed, but tragically can’t provide a copy for examination by anyone else because…lost in the same flood don’t you know. For example, a Brother Paul’s Children’s Mission sponsors list with Chris Busch name on it.
So why didn’t you say that the first time instead of implying that I had made the statements without corroboration?
My bad! Apologies.
I thought you were endorsing that video, wherein a similar claim is made, (“business documents”, rather than a sponsors list).
When false or unsubstantiated claims have been made by people who are friends of yours, (not talking about that video now), I have just let them slide. For many years in some cases. I wait to see if some good might come from those statements, just as a Richard Lawson fantasy about a trip to Amsterdam that never happened, ultimately led to Det. Williams generating an amazing database for anthropological study and analysis. As I’ve said many times, I’m very grateful to you and your family for all the info you’ve shared with us. It has primarily been mined for potentially incriminating info on one suspect or another, thus far, and it’s true value is not yet fully appreciated. Someday, it will be.
This is exactly why I keep saying these cases were treated in fragments. North Fox Island, Brother Paul’s Children’s Mission, the camp systems, the youth programs, and the OCCK investigation were all handled like separate boxes. But the same patterns keep showing up: access to children, weak oversight, protected men, and investigators who already knew more than the public was told. I’m not saying every person connects to every case. I’m saying the pattern was there, and it should have been taken seriously.
After Busch was arrested, it was all there for them to see but they chose to deep-six it. Dead kids were the collateral damage to protecting Chris Busch, probably H. Lee, and Frank Shelden’s crew. They bulldozed over everything–a couple of freaks got suicided–and Oakland County got an undeserved clean slate. Forget about it.
JT on the ’map’ of the paedophile network drawn by Gerald Richards may well have been this man Josiah T
I had serious concerns that it may also have been John Thwaytes – a lifelong paedophile priest bosom friend of Frank Shelden
That network map is very disturbing, especially with the commentary “ The town that Frank built” Which I am convinced refers to boys town In Mal Bazar India
The reference to the teddy bear club also has Chiling connections to Reverend Father John Robert Thwaytes
I am yet to be convinced that Reverend John had nothing to do with North Fox Island and OCCK
I am convinced he was involved in the former And very concerned at the possibility that he was involved in the latter