I hunted ‘strip search caller’ who tricked McDonald’s workers into sick sex games – what he made them do is unbelievable | The Sun
A TEENAGE McDonald’s worker is made to strip, dance naked and even perform a disturbing sex act – all on the orders of her female boss.
Louise Ogborn, 18, was coming to the end of her shift at the Mount Washington branch in Kentucky when manager Donna Summers called her into the office.
Donna had received a phone call from a police officer investigating a thief who had stolen a customer’s purse.
She believed the description he gave matched the shy, churchgoing 18-year-old.
On the cop’s instructions, she took Louise’s car keys and phone before locking her in the office – and subjecting the young employee to humiliation and abuse.
For three hours, Donna did everything “Officer Scott” told her – even when his demands became even more bizarre and twisted.
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But it wasn’t a real police officer on the line.
They were the latest victims of an elaborate hoax by a man dubbed the "Strip Search Caller”, who is believed to have targeted managers of more than 70 fast food outlets across America.
Now, true crime documentary Pervert: Hunting the Strip Search Caller is delving into the shocking case, which saw innocent victims stripped of their clothes and forced into vile sex games.
The show, which airs tonight on Channel 5, follows the incredible lengths detective Victor Flaherty goes to in order to catch the culprit – a manhunt which sees him travel thousands of miles to Panama City in Florida.
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Speaking to The Sun, the cop said: “All of these cases are shocking. The Kentucky case got a lot of notoriety, just because they actually had a video of it.
“This is probably the only case that 18 years later I still can remember specifics about. I can still remember talking to the victims and you have to understand I've investigated hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands of cases every day."
'I was scared for my life'
The 2004 Kentucky incident was captured on the office restaurant’s CCTV and the horrifying footage features in the documentary series, which is streaming now.
As the restaurant starts to get busy, Donna is instructed by the caller to find someone she trusts to continue with the 'investigation'.
She calls her fiance Walter Jr Nix, who similarly obeys “Officer Scott’s” instructions, including ordering Louise to sit on his lap and kiss him.
The teenager is horrifically then told to show her genitalia to Nix Jr to prove she isn't hiding the money there.
A visibly tearful Louise complies throughout the footage and is shown wiping her eyes.
It is also revealed that, as the caller's demands escalated, she was ordered to perform oral sex on Nix Jr to avoid being "punished".
Reflecting later on why she went along with the chilling games, Louise explained she was terrified of losing her job and had been brought up to obey adults.
She said: “My parents taught me when an adult tells you to do something that’s what you do. You don’t argue, you listen.
“Every time Donna came in the room, I begged, "Get me out of here. I didn’t do anything’. My soul just left my body and I went numb.”
She added: “I was scared for my life.”
Donna said she followed the caller’s instructions because he sounded so genuine. She later explained: “I did exactly what he said.
“When I asked him why, he always had an answer. I honestly thought he was a police officer.”
After the incident, Nix Jr reportedly fled the room and called a friend, saying: "I have done something terribly bad."
He was asking my manager to describe my body. He even asked for my bra size
In the documentary, journalist Connie Leonard explains how the caller targeted "young, impressionable people" working in "smaller cities" who were more likely to obey figures of apparent authority out of fear.
A woman only identified as Elizabeth, who was the ghoul's 26th documented victim, recalls eerily similar demands he made to her manager while she was working at a pizza restaurant in Blackfoot, Idaho.
"He was asking my manager to describe my body. He wanted him to describe my breast, what my genitalia looked like and even my bra size," she says.
"That's when I snatched the phone away screaming, 'How in the world could my bra cup size and all that type of stuff have anything at all to do with this allegedly stolen $50?'"
Elizabeth was eventually rescued by a colleague who knew it was illegal to strip search a minor, but says that when she went to the police, she was told the case was "not a priority for them".
'Scale of hoax blew my mind'
However, nearly 1,000 miles away from Kentucky in West Bridgewater, Chief Flaherty began investigating the strip search caller around the same time – after scam calls were placed to Boston-area restaurants.
It emerged that more than 70 incidents had been reported across 30 US states over a 12-year period, starting in 1992.
He said: “I initially thought it was a local issue. When it first came in we thought it was somebody maybe calling from across the street.
“I think the most shocking thing was that once I was working with the investigation was finding out how many of them had happened throughout the United States and this was a much larger issue.
“The number of incidents kind of blew my mind – and that they had been going on for a long time and that no one had actually identified the perpetrator yet.”
The calls were often placed to fast-food restaurants in rural areas but some grocery stories were also targeted.
Chief Flaherty said: “He did some serious harm to these people. He had to be caught – and I couldn’t understand why he hadn’t.”
Investigations revealed that pre-paid phone cards – known as calling cards in America and regularly used in the days before mobile phones – were used to make the calls.
For months, Chief Flaherty successfully applied for numerous court orders to trace the phone cards – eventually finding out that the call had originated from a Wal-Mart pay phone in Panama City, Florida.
After travelling to Panama City, he spent countless hours watching the supermarket CCTV footage searching for someone buying a phone card.
Chief Flaherty said: “I sat there for weeks watching these videos. There were six cameras – but nothing on the registers – flashing every 20 seconds.
“It was frustrating.”
Pooling intelligence with a fellow detective in Mount Washington, he eventually identified who he thought could be the suspect.
He said: “When that happened I just couldn't believe it. I was just like, ‘Holy cow’. We have video of the guy.
He added: “I saw he was wearing some type of what looked like police or law enforcement pants.
“So I really thought this was a cop.”
Local detectives didn’t recognise the man – but told him the trousers he was wearing meant he could be a correctional officer.
Chief Flaherty said: “In Florida, they only have three facilities and they're all independently run.”
After getting an identification at the second jail, he said: “I almost fell to the ground.
“They put a name to the face.”
Suspect tracked down
Dad-of-five David Stewart was accused of masterminding the bizarre and elaborate hoax. He was arrested and during questioning he claimed he had never bought a phone card.
But detectives found one during a search of his home that had been used to call numerous restaurants in the past year.
The prison officer, who had been turned down for dozens of police jobs, was extradited to Kentucky where he pleaded not guilty to charges of impersonating a police officer and solicitation of sodomy in the Mount Washington case.
In October 2006, a jury found him not guilty and he was acquitted of all charges.
A lack of direct evidence, such as a recording of the caller’s voice, was cited as a possible reason for leading the jury finding him not guilty.
Chief Flaherty said: “This was a complex case.”
He added: “At the time, it was very hard to convict somebody that was on the phone. I don't think anybody could get past that fact. He wasn’t there so how could he commit a crime?”
Walter Nix Jr was, however, sentenced to five years in prison for his role in the bizarre strip search and sexual assault after pleading guilty to charges of sexual assault. He was arrested shortly after the incident when Donna Summers realised she had been tricked.
Donna was fired after the incident. She was charged with unlawful imprisonment, and was sentenced to one-year probation after entering an Alford plea – meaning she did not admit guilt but acknowledged the evidence in the case.
Both Donna and Louise Ogborn, who needed treatment for PTSD and depression following the incident, sued McDonald’s for failing to warn about previous hoaxes.
Since David's arrest in 2004, the scam phone calls have stopped.
Reflecting on the case, Chief Flaherty said: “You’ve got understand that there's all these victims that were mentally affected for years – and probably still to this day.
“There are hundreds of victims and there’s probably more than we know because after they got this phone call, they never notified the police because they're embarrassed and knew this was a hoax."
Despite the hoax continuing for more than a decade, Chief Flaherty said: “I don't think it was a clever crime at all.
“He didn’t just pick up the phone and it worked on day one. His art form of doing this was over many, many calls where he got better at it.
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“Back then, most people didn’t question authority. If a police officer had told you to do something, you tended to do it."
Predator: Hunting the Strip Search Caller is on tonight on Channel 5 and available to stream on Paramount Plus
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