Dan Gable Opens Up About the Murder of His Sister

What's your Oregon experience? You know, here's another thing. Because it's kind of along the same line. And I hope I don't get emotional on this one. So, you know, when I was 15, I'd won a state championship. And my first state championship in wrestling. First year was a high school sophomore. Because that high school started then. And I, anyway, long story short, this neighbor kid ended up murdering my sister. And he had walked to school with me a couple weeks before that and said something to me who I, if I would have communicated, it might have saved her life. You know, just because she probably would have never let the guy into her house. What did he say? He just said, like, boy, you got a hot sister. You know, and he was kind of my age, one year older than me, but my sister was four years older than me. So he was probably 16 and she was 19. And she had a boyfriend and she was living at home yet. And so the funny thing is, is I didn't, I actually was going to come home and say something to her. But when I got home, I got distracted. And I said, oh, it's just boy talk. It's just boy talk. And it was mostly about he just thought my sister was really hot and that he would like to do something with her. But he never really said outright. I mean, I just figured something, the boys would like to do. But anyway, so that two weeks later, we're on a fishing trip with my mom and dad. And my sister's supposed to join us and she doesn't show up because she worked for my dad. After she went to college for a year and then she worked for my dad after that as a secretary, the real estate business. So she didn't show up. So we called the neighbor and back in those days, you didn't have cell phones. So we had a we had a phone that was outside a cabin that we rented. And I can date you because the date at the cabin we rented for four bucks a night. So, you know, it's just unheard of. And that was, you know, it would have been 1964. So we were at a payphone about a half a block from the cabin that we were renting. And we rolled the window down and you put the dime or nickel in the phone and you called. And my dad called the I was in the front backseat. My mom and dad were in the front. My dad was driving. And he called the neighbor and asked if my sister's car was still in the driveway. And he said, yes. So and she was supposed to be with us 90 miles away that morning. She didn't show up. So. So my dad and my mom get really nervous and I tell they tell him to go get break into that house. If you know if there's no, you know, you can't get in, break into it or she doesn't answer the door. But, you know, get into that house and call us back. So you can see the tension in the front seat of the car. You know, I can see my mom and dad were in the phone rings finally at about 15 minutes later. And all of a sudden the my dad drops the phone and and my mom was going. She was kind of going to start to go hysterical. I know what was wrong. And he looked over. I'll never forget this. You know, being a 15 year old kid and I looked at my dad said to her. Diane's not alive. And oh my God. You know, it's just my mom opened the door of the car. She took off running back to the block to the cabin. I got out and ran after when I when I followed her into the cabin. By that time she was already on the floor and she had grabbed her hair and she was pulling her head, hitting the wooden floor. And she looked up and she had blood all over her forehead. And so my dad then followed in and we packed up real quick. I'm like 10 minutes. We left half the stuff. Then we took off from my hometown. 90 miles away, but within 15 minutes within a half hour of that phone call. I was in the back seat. And there was a lot of trauma going on in that front seat. And I said to my dad. Dad, I may know something about this. I don't know for sure, but I may. And you know, he overreacted. He slammed the car, the brakes on the car, got out of the car, came around, opened the door, pulled me out, slammed me against the door. What do you mean? You may know something about it. And then I told him the story about the two weeks before that me walking to school with a neighbor kid and what he had said. And he just hugged me and threw me back in the car. And we stopped at the next town, which is about 15 miles later, and went into the police station. And we told the police what had happened as far as. Sister, daughter getting murdered the night before and we were on our way there. But my kid told me a story that I think if you could help me as soon as possible. So they called ahead to the Waterloo Police Department. The Waterloo Police located. He was at work, sacking groceries the next day in a grocery store. And so they and he'd actually admitted right there that he did it, you know, after they got him. But the thing is, what's amazing is this guy, then he escaped from prison after about 20. He was only 16. He went to got life in penitentiary, you know, and and he escaped. And that pretty much doomed him to ever getting out. And then because he was out for a month before they caught him and he actually in the trial, he was so mad about getting sentenced to life. In prison that he pointed to the Gable family and on the way out and he said he was going to kill us all. And so anyway, this guy goes to prison and he lives and he dies in prison after he broke out. He never really got a chance to ever let him out. But here's the thing. So it's just about, I don't know, say it's seven, eight years ago when he passed away. But we're we got another cabin now. It's about 30 miles north of the cabin that was we were in that time. And that was a rental cabin that's torn down now. And we go right by that place. So we're going right by that place. Actually, I'd been at me and my wife had been at our cabin that my mom and dad owned. And I inherited it when they passed on. But we were at that cancer cabin and we were coming home and we're going right by the spot where that patient. The bay phone was and where we had learned about her death and as a cell phone call. It's the warden of the prison he's in. I think it was Indiana. He was in Indiana, the prison. And the warden told me that the guy that murdered your sister just died. The exact same spot where I learned of the murder I was driving by and it's 130. It's about 150 miles from. Well, actually a lot further than that. So it's like spooky. It's like real spooky. And then what was really amazing is what he said to me. The warden. He said before he died, he was seeing a counselor and the counselor told me this, that he said, you know, I really, he repented. He said, I really shouldn't have. I feel bad about killing Diane Gable. I mean, this is years later, but that he had told and he had been rehabbed somewhat. And he goes, and the reason why he said, I knew I was going to kill somebody, but he said, because she was such a nice girl. You know, oh, my God. He said he knew he was going to kill somebody. Just it was just who he was. Yeah. And they told me that. And, you know, I cried for an hour and it got a lot out of me. But, you know, as bad as my dad felt, my mom felt, and, you know, I felt probably. I kind of got rid of a lot of hatred when he told me that he admitted that she was such a nice girl, that he shouldn't have done it. And it was, you know, probably not too for he probably did it on his deathbed or something, but he probably had all these guilt. But, but, you know, it helped me, too. And it helped me because even though I cried for an hour and I think that stuff you build up inside you sometimes, you just you don't know what it is. It's going to take to get it out of you. And I think that really helped me with my situation because you always feel a little guilty because of maybe you could have saved your life. But more than that, it's been something that I based my whole life on, too. Just communication. I mean, this is your business, communication. I mean, there's sometimes my wife tells me I'm telling her too much. You know, you don't need to tell me, you know, we don't need to talk about this. I said, yeah, I do. I do. You know, I need to talk about it's not just that. It's just anything that just crops up. I need to go home and I need to have a conversation with somebody that I that I like and love and to be able to see whether I'm doing the right thing or I'm not doing the right thing. Catch new episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience for free only on Spotify. Watch back catalog JRE videos on Spotify, including clips, easily, seamlessly switch between video and audio experience on Spotify. 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