Oldest serial killer suspect case set for Nov. 16 trial

The nation's oldest prosecution of a serial killer suspect is now set for trial Nov. 16.

Felix Vail, the Mississippi native who turned 76 behind bars Wednesday, is charged with the murder of Mary Horton Vail, whose 1962 death in Lake Charles, Louisiana, was originally ruled an accidental drowning.

He is the last known person to be with her and two other women: his common-law wife, Sharon Hensley, who disappeared in 1973; and his wife, Annette, who disappeared in 1984.

The Louisiana Appeals Court has ruled the disappearances of those women should be allowed as evidence under state law. The Louisiana Supreme Court is now considering an appeal.

Vail has insisted he is innocent, saying the charges against him are "fabricated" and that "there is a large amount of money, hate and political ambition behind them."

Louisiana authorities reopened the case after The Clarion-Ledger published its 2012 story "Gone," in which a forensic pathologist pointed to a bruise on the back of Mary Vail's head and a scarf 4 inches in her mouth as proof of homicide.

Vail was arrested seven months later. The Calcasieu Parish coroner, who is also a forensic pathologist, has ruled her death a homicide.

The Clarion-Ledger has also tracked down three potential new witnesses that say Vail discussed killing his first wife.

Rob Fremont said he was bicycling with Vail across California when he first admitted to killing his wife, only to later give more details, including that he hit her over the head and drowned her in the lake.

"It popped up out of nowhere," Fremont said. "I'm thinking, 'What the hell? Why would anyone do such a thing?' "

When Vail said those words, "there was such emotion, like he was still pissed off about it," he said. "I'll never forget it as long as I live."

He never traveled with Vail again.

Bruce Biedebach said he met Vail in the late 1960s in San Diego.

He said his twin brother, Brian, now deceased, was close with Vail. His half-sister, Carolyn, later married the Mississippi native.

During a party then at a beach home in Mission Beach, California, Biedebach recalled a group of guys taking psychedelic drugs and bragging about things they had done that no one else had.

When it came Vail's turn, he told the group he had killed someone, Biedebach recalled.

"He told us he drowned his wife," he said. "He said he held her underwater."

Alexandra Christiansen, who says she was married briefly to Vail in 1978 or so, said Vail became so angry with her that he began choking her in the shower.

Earlier in the same argument, she said he mentioned his first wife's death.

She said Vail told her, "You know my first wife died."

"You told me she drowned," she said she replied.

She said Vail then remarked, "I could have saved her, but I chose not to."

She took his remark as "a threat to me that I better watch it, that he was capable of killing."

Vail began drinking, she said. "He could be so gentle and so kind, but when he drank, he didn't look like himself anymore. It was as if his soul left his body."

Before his wife, Mary, died in 1962, Vail took out two separate life insurance policies on her.

Jacine Brooks of Sulphur, Louisiana, who worked then in the Traveler's Insurance Claim Department in Lake Charles, said Vail's wife never signed the life insurance policy he took out before she died on Oct. 28, 1962.

"She did not sign the policy, and she needed to sign it," Brooks said. "The agent got in a little trouble."

In contrast, she said, Vail did not take out a life insurance policy on himself.

Contact Jerry Mitchell at jmitchell@jackson.gannett.com or (601) 961-7064. Follow him on Twitter @jmitchellnews.