Doctoral Student Sexually Assaulted, Strangled To Death By Serial Rapist in Philadelphia
Shannon Schieber, a 23-year-old Wharton School doctoral student, was found raped and strangled to death in her Philadelphia apartment. Her attacker was then linked to multiple crimes in two states.
Shannon Schieber, a 23-year-old Wharton School doctoral student, was found raped and strangled to death in her Philadelphia apartment on Thursday, May 7, 1998.
About 12 hours earlier, Schieber’s neighbor had dialed 911. In the taped call, he said he heard her “yell, 'Help,'” and a “choking-type sound.” Police had rushed to the scene, but left when they got no response after knocking on Schieber’s door and observed no signs of foul play, according to the “One Killer, One Thousand Miles” episode of Philly Homicide, airing Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen.
On Thursday afternoon, the same neighbor called 911 again. Schieber’s brother had come by to check on her. The men forced the door open and found her dead body.
“She was naked on the bed, face down,” said Chuck Boyle, a former Philadelphia Police Department detective.
Semen on Schieber’s body and the bed indicated there’d been a sexual attack. The evidence was sent to the crime lab to be tested for DNA.
It took police three years to arrest the man who killed Schieber. Her case proved to be a turning point in the way the Philadelphia Police Department investigated sexual attacks, according to NBC10 Philadelphia.
Who was Shannon Schieber?
Vicki Schieber recalled her daughter’s “strong personality” and said that losing her left “a huge hole in the heart.”
Schieber’s dad, Sylvester Schieber, proudly recalled that his daughter had “a voracious appetite for learning.”
A high achiever, she graduated from Duke University in three years with a triple major in mathematics, economics and philosophy.
She then enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School to pursue a doctoral degree in finance. Schieber was finishing her first year there when she was killed.
What killed Shannon Schieber?
The medical examiner determined that Schieber had been strangled.
Police began their investigation by considering the victim’s inner circle.
Investigators learned that Schieber had filed a stalking complaint against a fellow doctoral candidate. He was questioned and swabbed for DNA. But, a week-and-a-half later, DNA results cleared the doctoral candidate as a suspect.
DNA evidence from the crime scene didn’t match anyone in a criminal records database. “We were chasing a ghost,” said Boyle.
Detectives turned their focus to crimes where DNA was collected but not classified as a sexual assault.
Jeffrey Piree, who was then a Philadelphia Police Department detective, requested all evidence, regardless of whether it was coded as a sexual assault or not, to be compared to DNA collected in Schieber’s Rittenhouse Square-area apartment.
A bombshell revelation
Eight months into the case, in January of 1999, Boyle and Piree learned that the lab found four sexual assaults that matched the DNA evidence in Schieber’s case.
“Shannon was not the first victim,” said Boyle.
A rapist “was targeting young women blocks from where Shannon was attacked and murdered,” Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Craig McCoy said on Philly Homicide.
The four other victims, who survived, were all attacked along the Pine Street corridor, close to Rittenhouse Square.
Detectives Boyle and Piree discovered that officers neglected to thoroughly investigate these other crimes, which led to the cases being labeled as simple assaults, not sexual assaults.
“If a case was difficult, if a case had few leads, they would quietly re-code the crime in the complaint,” McCoy said. “That way, they dropped out of the crime statistics.”
RELATED: Three Philadelphia Women Raped and Killed By "Necrophiliac" Kensington Strangler
After Boyle and Piree brought the failures to light, the Philadelphia Police Department’s Sex Crimes Unit, which was formed in 1991, was overhauled. With new protocols in place, a Special Victims Unit was formed.
“It was adopted by other departments around the country,” said Boyle.
“They sent two cops out to answer Shannon's call for help. Those two cops didn’t know there was a serial set of assaults going on because Sex Crimes didn't even tell them,” Schieber’s father, Sylvester Schieber, said on Philly Homicide. “This whole thing is full of rot.”
Rapist's victims interviewed
Boyle and Piree interviewed the women who’d been raped. “These girls were all strangled,” said Boyle, adding that the perp told one woman, “I wish we’d met under different circumstances.”
With help from one of the victims, a sketch was made of the suspect and distributed around the area where the crimes took place. The press labeled the perp the “Center City rapist.”
On August 28, 1999, a year and three months after Schieber’s murder, a student at the University of the Arts was raped and strangled. Detectives were convinced the serial rapist was back.
DNA from the crime scene was collected and sent to the crime lab. “It was a 100% match to the other cases,” said Boyle. “The Center City rapist had struck again.”
Officials doubled down on resources to track down the offender. Despite the massive efforts, the case eventually went cold.
A lead pops up in Colorado
In early 2001, Philadelphia investigators were alerted to an APB that had been issued by the Fort Collins police department in Colorado.
Seven women were attacked that the Fort Collins police department knew of, and investigators in Philadelphia had reached out, saying that they were investigating a series of sexual assaults and a homicide there, and that some of the details matched those in the Colorado cases.
The Colorado rapes were committed by a slender male who spoke softly and gained access through a window or side door. “He sounded like the Center City rapist,” said Boyle.
Police in both cities joined forces to catch the elusive rapist and killer. At one of the crime scenes in Colorado, the rapist left a sweaty baseball cap. DNA from the hat matched the Center City rapist.
Troy Graves emerges as a suspect
Based on data from driver’s licenses, credit card information, and public records, investigators compiled a list of people tied to both Philadelphia and Fort Collins when the crimes were committed.
Taking account of gender, age, and other parameters, the list was whittled down to 44 suspects. One of the names that popped out on the list was Troy Graves.
He had joined the Air Force in September of 1999 and was assigned to Francis E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He married in March of 2001 and lived with his wife in Fort Collins.
RELATED: Patient with Extreme Pain Fatally Beats Philadelphia-Area Chiropractor: "A Jaw for a Jaw"
Graves agreed to speak with detectives in Fort Collins. He came to the police station with his wife. While he was questioned, officials raced to secure a warrant to obtain his DNA and fingerprints.
Graves was soft-spoken and polite, but he failed to mention that he’d been questioned about an on-base incident in which a woman reported that an attempt had been made to enter her room.
In another room, Graves’ wife said her husband had a cap like the one in evidence and that it had seemingly gone missing. She also said she’d seen flyers about the rapes in Fort Collins and saw a resemblance between the suspect and Graves, according to Philly Homicide.
Troy Graves arrested
With a warrant in hand, investigators collected DNA and fingerprints from Graves. The prints matched evidence in the Fort Collins crimes, and Graves was arrested.
On May 17, 2002, Graves pleaded guilty to 10 separate charges in Fort Collins, including four counts of sexual assault, two counts of unlawful sexual contact and first-degree kidnapping.
He was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
Who was the Center City rapist?
Graves was then charged with crimes in Philadelphia. He told detectives how he’d watch women and choose his next victim.
On May 30, 2002, Graves pleaded guilty to the murder of Schieber, for which he received life in prison. He also pleaded guilty to six counts of sexual assault for the crimes against Schieber and the other Philadelphia victims. He was sentenced to an additional 60 to 120 years for those crimes.
To learn more about the case, watch the “One Killer, One Thousand Miles” installment of Philly Homicide, which airs new episodes on Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen.
