2 wives of dead Iowa ‘serial killer’ who killed more than 70 women over 3 decades committed suicide

The two wives of a dead ‘serial killer’, accused by his daughter of murdering up to 70 women, committed suicide, police reports said.

Donald Dean Studey, who died in 2013, has been charged with killing between 50 and 70 women and two men on his property in Iowa.

Many have speculated that Studey’s two deceased wives were also murdered by the alleged killer, but police reports say otherwise.

Both Studey’s wives committed suicide, police said. One of them reportedly died of strangulation and the other shot himself.

The revelation comes after Studey’s name was made headlines after his daughter Lucy said she knew “where the bodies were buried.”

Lucy claimed her father forced her and her siblings to dump the bodies of women he killed in a 30-foot pit on their farmland on Green Hollow Road decades ago. Lucy insisted that she tried to tell people as a child, but people didn’t listen to her.

Her older sister Susan, however, dismissed the accusations, saying their father was strict, but certainly not a murderer.

“My dad wasn’t the man she makes of him,” Susan Studey told me News week. “He was strict, but he was a protective parent who loved his children… Strict fathers don’t just turn into serial killers.”

An investigation into the alleged murders has been opened, and the FBI and the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation are both assisting local law enforcement.

The property, on Green Hollow Road, is being searched after Studey’s daughter Lucy claimed to know “where the bodies are” and cadaver dogs smelled human remains on the property.

Fremont County Sheriff Kevin Aistrope confirmed the investigation Tuesday, saying, “I believe her 100 percent there are bodies in it.”

Law enforcement officers suspect he lured a woman, believed to be sex workers, from Omaha, Nebraska, to his five acres of land before killing them.

Forty-five years after Studey’s death, the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that cadaver dogs alerted at least four spots on the property with human remains last week, the latter receiving multiple “hits.”

The dog handler and sheriff have said they believe the remains are human, as the dogs have been trained to ignore animal bones.

However, Susan believes that the cadaver dogs that searched the property over the weekend were fooled by the remains of Studey’s stillborn sister, who was buried in a shoebox on the property, as well as the remains of a golden retriever.

While Lucy told authorities that their father forced the siblings to use a wheelbarrow in the warmer months and a toboggan run in the winter to transport the corpses across farmland in Thurman, Iowa, her sister refuted this.

Susan told Newsweek that the first time she ever heard of bodies being buried on the property was when she spoke to Lucy about a year ago.

Lucy Studey (pictured) accused her father of being a murderer and forcing his children to drop bodies into a 30-foot pit on their farmland

“I’m two years older than Lucy. I think I would know if my father had killed,’ she said. “I would know if my father was a serial killer. He wasn’t, and I want my father’s name restored.”

Susan added that the only time she remembers her father getting violent was when a neighbor hit their dog — leading to Studey fighting the man.

According to Lucy, the four siblings did their father’s order when he told them to “go to the hills” because they were terrified they would “not come back” according to his daughter.

Lucy said her father was “usually drunk” and liked to kill women by smashing or kicking the women’s heads in a trailer.

Investigators believe his daughter’s claims, and if true, would make Studey one of the most prolific serial killers in American history.

Lucy Studey claims her father Donald Dean Studey was a serial killer who forced her and her siblings to transport the bodies of women killed by him to a 100-foot pit.

Authorities were made aware of her allegations, in which she describes using a wheelbarrow in the warmer months and a toboggan run in the winter to move the corpses across farmland in Thurman, Iowa.

The Fremont County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that cadaver dogs were alerted in several spots on the property, as well as some on adjacent land

Lucy claims the women all had dark hair, were white, and most were in their 20s and 30s, except for a 15-year-old runaway — and two men.

They were all dressed and buried in jewels, with Lucy claiming that her father kept the gold teeth as trophies.

Lucy told Newsweek: “He would just tell us to get to the source, and I knew what that meant.

“Every time I went to the pit or into the hills, I didn’t think I’d come down. I thought he was going to kill me because I wouldn’t shut up.

‘I don’t feel anything for my father. Nothing. I wanted justice when my father was alive, but he’s gone. I just want some closure and a decent funeral for the families.’

However, Lucy’s older sister Susan believes the cadaver dogs were fooled by the remains of Donald Studey’s stillborn sister, who was buried on the property, and the remains of a pet

According to Lucy, the four siblings complied with their father’s orders when he told them to “go to the hills” because they were terrified they “wouldn’t come back,” his daughter said.

Investigators believe his daughters claim Studey is one of the most prolific serial killers in American history

Studey reportedly forced his children to pile dirt and chemical lye on the bodies after dumping them in the pit.

Lucy has repeatedly offered to take a lie detector test to back up her claims, Newsweek reported.

Lucy added: ‘All I want is for these sites to be excavated, for people to be shut down and for these women to have a decent burial. My father was a lifelong criminal and murderer.”

It is unclear whether her siblings cooperated with authorities.

A third sister in the sibling group could not be reached. Their brother died by suicide when he was 39.

The FBI and Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation are both assisting local law enforcement in the investigation

When the police drill the well and dig the site, it becomes a ‘big mission’.

Authorities added that the cost of drilling the well would be about $25,000, while a full excavation would be more than $300,000.

The property, on Green Hollow Road, is not an official crime scene as officers have not yet discovered any remains.

Studey, who had “love” and “hate” tattooed on his knuckles, is said to have a criminal past, but was known to use different aliases.

He was jailed in Missouri in the 1950s for petty robbery, in Omaha in 1989 for drink-driving – as police confirmed they rarely went to the trailer he lived in because they were “warning” of him.