On Saturday, November 8, 1980, 11-year-old
Kim Peterson met Bishop at a Salt Lake
City roller-skating rink. They talked
about skates,
Kim mentioning that he would like to sell his and buy a new pair. Bishop
feigned interest, telling Peterson he would pay $35 for the skates. It is
unclear whether Bishop agreed to meet Kim on Sunday, or what name he used, but
Peterson left home with the skates on November 9, telling his parent he had
found a buyer. No names were mentioned, but he promised to come straight home
after the transaction was concluded.
He never made it.
Police were called to the Peterson home near
sundown, when Kim failed to return in time for dinner. Another fruitless search
began, including a canvass of skaters from the rink where Kim had met his
presumed abductor on Saturday. Several witnesses recalled a youth of Peterson's
description, talking to a man aged 25 to 35, full-faced with glasses, wearing
blue jeans and an army-style jacket or parka. Two of the witnesses agreed to be
hypnotized, the session producing further details: dark hair and bushy
eyebrows, weight around 200 pounds. One skater claimed the man had driven away
in a silver Chevy Camaro with out-of-state license tags, perhaps from Nevada.
The leads were useless.
Police saw no similarity to their suspect in
"Roger Downs," living in an apartment several blocks from Kim
Peterson's home. Again, they questioned him routinely, making no connection to
the Daniels case. Nothing in the bland 29-year-old's demeanor let them know
that he had bludgeoned Kim Peterson to death and buried his corpse near
Alonzo's, outside Cedar Fort.
There was plenty of room in the desert, and
murder was easier the second time around. Bishop still feared arrest, still
spared his victims if they promised not to talk, but he was learning that
murder provided a rush all its own.
In time, he would begin to crave it like a
drug.