Boys Murdered In 1983 To Be Memorialized By New Crime Victims Monument In Sarpy County

From Nebraska Examiner:

By Paul Hammel

April 11, 2023

LINCOLN — Two Sarpy County boys slain by a serial killer in 1983 will be memorialized with a new monument for crime victims to be unveiled April 25.

The monument “seeks to memorialize Danny Joe Eberle and Christopher Walden as well as bring awareness to crime victims and their families and the struggles they endure,” said Capt. Jacob Betsworth of the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office.

It will also start fund-raising for a county fund, handled by a foundation set up by the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office, that will provide grants to families of crime victims, Betsworth said.

Eberle, 13, and Walden, 12, were victimized by John Joubert, who abducted the boys from neighborhood streets in Sarpy County three months apart in the fall of 1983. The boys were later found dead.

The crimes shocked the area and prompted near panic among parents, who stopped letting their children walk along the streets alone.

Joubert, an airman stationed at Offutt Air Force Base, was arrested in January 1984 after threatening a preschool teacher in Bellevue. He pleaded guilty to the abductions and murders and was executed in the electric chair in 1996.

Joubert was also linked to a 1982 murder of an 11-year-old boy in Portland, Maine, where Joubert had graduated from high school.

The unveiling of the Eberle-Walden Crime Victims Memorial is scheduled at 1 p.m. April 25 at the east entrance to the Sarpy County Administration building in Papillion.

The public is welcome to attend, Betsworth said. Donations to the crime victims fund can be made through the website: https://midlandscommunity.org/...

Nebraskans want accountability from their elected officials and government. They want to know whether their tax dollars are being well-spent, whether state agencies and local governments are responsive to the people and whether officials, programs and policies are working for the common good. The Nebraska Examiner is a nonprofit, independent news source committed to providing news, scoops and reports important to our state.