Susan Marcia Rose. (Photo credit: Suffolk County District Attorney's Office)
Decades after another man was tried, charged, and acquitted, John Michael Irmer was finally arraigned on Monday in Boston after allegedly admitting to authorities last month that it was he who hit Susan Marcia Rose over the head with a hammer, killing her just one night before Halloween more than 40 years ago.
Irmer, 68, was arraigned Monday morning at the Boston Municipal Court, a clerk confirmed with Law&Crime. He faces charges of murder and aggravated rape. Irmer confessed to agents at an FBI office in Portland, Oregon, last month, according to Massachusetts District Attorney Kevin Hayden.
Irmer met with the FBI twice this August and according to police records, at the initial interview, he said he wanted to "confess to several murders, one of which occurred in the Back Bay section of Boston, Massachusetts around Halloween."
Irmer told police he saw Rose in 1979, then just 24, at a skating rink near Boston's Back Bay and that it was her red hair that stood out to him, he said.
Records note that during his initial interview and confession, Irmer said he couldn't recall other details about Rose beyond the fact that she was white. Her name or age didn't stand out, he said, and he told police during that first interview that when he met Rose she had been "quarreling" with her boyfriend.
Irmer said the boyfriend "wanted to explore" an empty building with them on Beacon Street that was under renovation at the time. A police record notes that Irmer claimed it was once inside the building with the boyfriend that he found a hammer and struck Rose with it, killing her instantly. Then, he said, he sodomized her.
During his second interview with the FBI last month, however, Irmer's story changed. This time, he said that he met Rose at the skating rink and they both went back to her apartment. They used the bathroom, he said, and then went for a walk.
"They stopped at a demolition house and went inside. At this point, Irmer struck [Rose] one time with a hammer. Irmer then put the hammer inside of her body, took her wallet and threw it into the Charles River. Irmer believed [she] possibly had an IUD as Irmer felt something inside her [during the attack,]" a Boston Police record states.
Beyond striking Rose on the head with a hammer he found inside the building and then raping her, police said Irmer also told the FBI that he dragged her body up a flight of stairs and sodomized her with a broom handle.
Police noted there were multiple signs of blunt force trauma on the then 24-year-old woman's head and Irmer's semen was found in multiple orifices.
Remarkably, Irmer was in prison for another crime, he said, and when he was released in 2012. Arrest records note that Irmer said he was "surprised that the Boston Police weren't waiting for him because he knew that his DNA was taken and submitted to [Combined DNA Index System] while in prison."
Irmer admitted to authorities that after he killed Rose, he fled to New York.
At the time of her death, in addition to the blunt force injuries found on her head, there were multiple lacerations to her brain and records note Rose was found half naked and in a pool of her blood. "Brain matter" was also found on stairs.
"Nearly 44 years after losing her at such a young age, the family and friends of Susan Marcia Rose will finally have some answers. This was a brutal, ice-blooded murder made worse by the fact that a person was charged and tried — and fortunately, found not guilty — while the real murderer remained silent until now," Hayden said Monday.
The district attorney continued: "No matter how cold cases get resolved, it's always the answers that are important for those who have lived with grief and loss and so many agonizing questions."
Bail was not granted for Irmer on Monday.