The La Crosse Theory

Thanks to Richard for the heads up on this. I really, really, don't have time to do this right now, but I am passionate enough about the cause that I'm going to help Richard out and regurgitate my theory, which I've probably already done somewhere.

A dude named Craig Meyers was found in the Mississippi River in La Crosse earlier this week. Craig was a 21 year old college student, appeared to be in decent enough shape, and had been out drinking in La Crosse. This makes the NINTH male in his early to mid-20's that allegedly got drunk and drown in the Mississippi River in La Crosse since 1997.

A little history may be in order here. I am a 2003 graduate of UW-La Crosse, as is Sports Bottle. Richard (frequent commenter, avid swimmer) is a 2004 graduate. From 1999 to 2003 (and often enough in 2004) we probably got drunk a minimum of three times a week, and often 4 or 5 times. I am going to say that the majority of those times we ended up in the main bar district area of La Crosse. I should also explain that when I say we got drunk, I don't mean that we got a little tipsy and crawled in a car with a DD or called a cab. I mean, we got annihilated and stumbled the half mile or so home in the middle of the night. People not from Wisconsin cannot comprehend how drunk we are capable of getting. Trust me, I lived in Nebraska for three years, those people have no clue what it means to be Wisconsin drunk. I'm not bragging, I'm just stating fact so that you can understand my theory here. Between Wednesday and Saturday nights in La Crosse (not unlike most college towns in Wisconsin) there are many, many drunk people milling around. Both men and women. In fact, my wife falls in nearly the same category as I do as far as getting super drunk in La Crosse and stumbling around town. So trust me when I tell you that there are not only guys blacked out and walking around. Some might say it is an epidemic, I call it fun, but that isn't the point.

If you aren't familiar with the layout of La Crosse, the campus of UW-La Crosse, and all of the living area where a college age student would be, starts about 24th street or so (24 blocks from the river). The bars/hotels are mostly on 3rd street (3 blocks from the river) and there are a few hotels on 2nd street (but there aren't really any bars closer than 3 blocks from the river). In order to get to the actual water of the river itself, you would have to walk through a park and down a fairly long/jagged pile of large rocks, or jump off of a bridge. There aren't any flat spots anywhere near the river for someone to decide to go swimming, and there aren't any spots that I know of other than a bridge, where you could jump straight down into the river.

So now that you have that general frame of reference, here is the theory. The only explanation that makes any sense is a female serial killer. Follow me here. I estimate that I've been super duper drunk approximately 450 times in La Crosse (12 times a month, 10 months, 4 years) which may even be conservative. I have never even ONCE wandered the wrong direction towards the river. And if you did, you would immediately notice that there are a) no lights in that direction and b) a large body of water in front of you. But even if you think: "Hey asshole, what if these guys can't hand their booze as well as you and are so blacked out that they aren't sure where they are, or are unfamiliar?" First, I would submit that it is pretty rare for someone in their 20's to get that drunk all by themselves. Usually at least ONE person would be with them. And my understanding is that all of the victims here were familiar with the area. I also find it a little too convenient that the victims were all 1) male; 2) early to mid 20's; 3) in fairly decent shape. I think the thing that makes the least sense is that all of the victims are male. There is no lack of females drunk and at the bars in La Crosse. There is no way that if this was all about drinking that there wouldn't be at least ONE female victim. So my theory is that there is a female serial killer (whether part of a larger group or not, I dunno) that is meeting these guys at the bar and luring them away from the group and somehow drugging them with something untraceable, and pushing them into the river. The victims never have injuries, never have any drugs in their systems, never are anything but drunk. Maybe one of these people actually wandered into the river. Maybe one killed themselves by jumping off of a bridge. But NINE???? No fucking way. Finally, consider the layouts of other campuses/bar areas in the state for a moment:

Green Bay: bar district one block from the Fox River, on BOTH sides of the river
Eau Claire: giant fucking river/narrow walking bridge that is heavily traveled over said river
Milwaukee: Water Street anyone? Many, many other bars on bodies of water.
Appleton: Bars about three blocks from the River, college campus right on it.
Oshkosh: drunk people and water all over town
Madison: two fucking lakes basically right on campus
River Falls: I presume there is a river somewhere
Menominee: River

Number of drunk/drowning deaths that I'm aware of: ZERO. I'm not 100% positive on most of the places, but I'm positive on Green Bay and Appleton. This just doesn't happen anywhere else. People that blame drinking problems in La Crosse for these deaths can't explain this factor to me.

I'm really, truly not trying to make light of this. I'm dead serious. I feel terrible for the families of these guys, and I'm just trying to make sense of this while the media and police treat the victims like irresponsible, drunken assholes.

There are just too many coincidences here for me. Now, I should probably get going before I get fired.

Thoughts from other UW attendees? Wisconsin bar patrons?