The Vampire of Doom City

From the pages of

Originally published
June, 2013

Part 5

Bambi Madden’s birthday is celebrated every June with a balloon release at Otsinango Park. The CBS procedural “Without a Trace” offered to include Bambi Madden in the true story section at the end of an episode. According to Amanda Barry, one of Madden’s twelve siblings, the story fell through when the Binghamton Police refused to cooperate. Madden’s family then hired a private investigator from Virginia that met the same brick wall. He returned their money, claiming the case was unsolvable. The family plans a fundraiser this summer, after the balloon release, to hire another investigator.

Barry believes the police conspiracy, citing the Vampire graffiti and a dearth of circumstantial evidence. A friend of Bambi’s mother worked as an undercover prostitute for BPD, and lost her job after relating a story of two officers that joked about Madden’s corpse never being found. When rumors surfaced that Madden’s body was buried in the basement of Sarah’s bar, police did only a cursory walkthrough without breaking any ground. They also will not release the name of a drug dealer who was sent to prison based on Madden’s testimony. He’d been released shortly before Madden’s 2006 disappearance, and word on the street had him looking for revenge.

Barry spoke with the Police Gazette in the back corner of Nezuntos, where she drank coffee from Dunkin’ Donuts. Her face was a mass of open sores and one tooth protruded from her gums. It  would be naive to ignore these symptoms of methamphetamine abuse. Bambi Madden was commonly known to be a prostitute, and inhabited an area of the city rife with drugs and crime. Barry couldn’t site any hard evidence for a conspiracy beyond the Vampire messages themselves, and a note tied to a rock thrown through the window of Bambi’s landlord. This was the same building where Madden resided in the lower apartment until she disappeared. Barry didn’t know if the note still existed, but promised that someone had a picture of it somewhere. The NPG has not heard from Barry since. I’m sure I would have recognized the handwriting.

Barry admitted she knew Michael Petrucci. He’d been a drinking buddy to her father. I didn’t read about Petrucci’s 2010 arrest until I began writing this story, but I’d noticed his absence. For years I followed him through muddy back alleys, along flood walls, and shrouded areas beneath highway supports where no person in their right mind is likely to stick their nose. Petrucci was the graffiti artist that captured not only my interest, but had garnered print and television time as well when it seemed he might know details someone didn’t want in the light. Petrucci was arrested as the graffiti artist I’d named “The Vampire.” According to Barry, charges were dismissed against Petrucci the day of his trial and he was shipped out of town and never seen again. Petrucci told the family he had a letter with proof of Chief Zikuski’s guilt. He was about to deliver this information when he was arrested.

Barry confirmed Petrucci’s drug and drinking problems, which can have a synergistic affect with any number of chemicals Anitec and Titchner flushed down the toilet in that part of the city. The Vampire held Zikuski accountable for the murder of Michelle Harris in some of his earliest messages. The wife of a rich Owego used-car dealer is a far cry from Zikuski’s alleged MO of prostitutes like Bambi Madden and Terry Dittman.

I came to predict Petrucci’s movements. If Zikuski made the news, I would find a new message within a few days. When the Vampire finally returned after the conviction of Bobbi Jo Hatchcock, the Vampire blanketed the Riverwalk and Boscov’s parking garage with claims of a hoax. The masterpiece on the riverbank side of a highway bridge support not only gave intimate details to Zikuski’s relationship with Dittman, it also accused Zikuski of funneling $80,000 to Osama Bin Laden. It was hundreds of words and illustrations. Petrucci spent hours back there, spelling out a conspiracy that quickly descended to nonsense. I found his final message in the Boscov’s parking garage, shortly after Zikuski spoke on national news following the A.C.A. shootings. The Vampire suggested that Jiverly Wong had not taken his own life, but had instead been shot by police. Oddly enough, Zikuski was not mentioned. Unknown to me, Petrucci was arrested shortly after.

Petrucci didn’t have any secret evidence on the Madden killing, he plugged names he saw on television into a story I’d been watching him write for years. Petrucci’s real crime was to convince a grieving family to place their hope in a theory and drive the investigation to inaction. After speaking with Barry, I reached out myself with questions to the Broome County Sheriff and Binghamton Police. Sheriff Captain Fred Akshar responded by email, “... if you wish to discuss the disappearance of Bambi Madden and the associated people in that case, we would be happy to meet with you...” When I arrived, I was told the Madden and Dittman cases were both jurisdiction of the Binghamton Police, and the Sheriff’s office could not comment on either. Binghamton had not yet responded, so I called that morning. I spoke with a detective that referred me to Lt. Burnett, who was off that day. I was transferred to his voice mail. I did my best to explain myself, and my position, but my call was not returned.

Some have praised Jack the Ripper for granting his unfortunate victims an immortality they could not have achieved otherwise. Bambi Madden’s disappearance and probable murder is a carbon copy of a crime that happens everywhere. They are difficult to solve and easy to forget. Bambi Madden lived a dangerous life and associated with dangerous people involved with criminal activity. Unemployment, poverty, and dangerous drugs fester in unseen sections of Binghamton. Did the police become tight-lipped with information after Madden’s family pushed to dig up multiple basements to pursue a rumor?

Bambi Madden may have lived a hard life and supported it with poor decisions, but that does not warrant a death sentence. Her family deserves the opportunity to face her killer in court, no matter how they’ve lived their own lives. Bambi’s killer is probably someone she knew well, probably someone involved in the same activities. Petrucci himself fits this description. The Vampire’s flow-chart beneath the highway identifies a “Mike” that knew Dittman’s killer, and was being set-up by Zikuski as a “dead scapegoat.”  Were his messages expressions of his own guilt? Seven years on, there is probably little evidence to find Madden or her killer. Instead, she will rest as one of the great mysteries of the Twilight Zone.

THE END