The Story of Marvin Heemeyer
Bizarre Buffet Podcast
Marvin John Heemeyer (October 28, 1951 – June 4, 2004) was an automobile muffler repair shop owner who, following a dispute with town officials, demolished numerous buildings with a modified bulldozer in Granby, Colorado, on June 4, 2004.
Thank you to all of our Bizarre Buffet supporters! As you all know, Bizarre Buffet is a multilayered, entirely indie production. This episode is a little late, but please know that we will always come back ! Now, please enjoy our usual weekly release schedule! Help the show by leaving a review on Apple / iTunes !
Listen To ” The Killdozer ” From Bizarre Buffet Right Here!
Click image to listen, or
Watch ” The Killdozer ” From Bizarre Buffet On YouTube!
Follow Bizarre Buffet Online
Support Bizarre Buffet On Patreon
Follow Bizarre Buffet On Instagram
Like Bizarre Buffet On Facebook
Subscribe To Bizarre Buffet On YouTube
Follow The Host’s Of Bizarre Buffet
Follow Marc Bluestein On Instagram
Follow Jen Wilson On Instagram
Follow Mark Tauriello On Instagram
” The Killdozer ” – Episode Credits
Hosted By: Mark Tauriello, Jen Wilson, & Marc Bluestein.
Original story / episode concept by Mark Tauriello.
Original episode art by Mark Tauriello.
Episode show notes by Mark Tauriello.
Audio / Visual production by Marc Bluestein
” The Killdozer ” – Show Notes
KILLDOZER
Intro: What is the best revenge you ever got on someone?
This is a revenge story about Marvin Heemeyer who sought revenge on an entire town in June of 2004.
About Marvin: Born October 28, 1951, Marvin resided in the the town of Granby, Colorado which he moved to in the late 80s early 90s. Granby is about 80 miles north west of Denver.
-There isn’t a lot of information about his early life and upbringing, but for this story I don’t feel like it’s not going to be relevant to the events that took place while he lived in Granby.
He was described as a strong willed man who valued freedom. Very dynamic but also didn’t take shit from anyone and would often be short tempered.
He said he had a champaign income with a beer taste
In 1992 he purchased 2 acres of land from the Resolution Trust Company for $42,000 and he opened up his own muffler shop. He has a strong knowledge in engineering, automobiles, and so on. His brother Ken describes him as someone who would bend over backwards for you. But town resident Christie Baker claimed that her husband was threatened by Marvin after refusing to pay for a disputed muffler repair for $124. (In his defense, I would have done the same if someone tried to stiff me or pull a fast one on me).
He did decent at his repair shop and he also generate money doing car restorations as well.
Connecting on the property was a concrete batch plant which was owned by a prominent family in the town. The owner, Cody Docheff and Marvin had bad blood because Cody originally wanted to purchase the property before Marvin, but Marvin had outbidded him.
Down the line, Cody Docheff offered to by the land from Marvin for $250 K, and Marvin said yes…then changed his mind and upped the price to $375K…and realized this family had much more money so then he upped the price to $1Million to spite them.
Its unclear as to how much Marvin sold the land for, but he had sold it to them while still keeping his muffler shop.
In the process of all this, there was a rezoning proposal from the town. In 2001 Granby’s zoning commission and trustees approved of new construction for the concrete plant, which ultimately would block the road to his muffler shop making it inaccessible.
Heemeyer spent tens and thousands of dollars to appeal the decision but the town didn’t side with him. To put salt on the wound, he was also fined $2500 on the spot for not having a septic tank on the property that his muffler shop occupied. That being said, they wanted him to connect to the town sewer system which would cost $80,000. He was also fined for improperly dumping sewage from his business instead of connecting to the city sewer system.
He even purchased a bulldozer to pave a new entertence to his shop for the event that the concrete plant would block access.
During this hoopla…
-local media made a mockery of him
-he had bad blood with the towns people and the zoning board
-bad blood with the police
-bad blood with the Docheff Family.
-becoming more and more engaged with the world
The 18 months leading to the events of June 4 2004, he rented the small space where his shop was and lived in there, day after day fighting the town while plotting his revenge
THE KILL DOZER
-Marvin purchased a bulldozer, taking up the entire space of the shop. It was a Komatsu D355A (Yes because I naturally know bulldozer models) which he referred to as the MK tank. He hand designed make shift armor with concrete and metal plates which covered the bulldoser.
Parts of the armor were over 1 foot thick with concrete sandwiched between sheets of steel. From this design the machine was immune to small fire arms and even explosives. It ended up looking like a brutalist building or the ship the Jawas used in Star Wars on Tatooine. The rusty trapezoid thing made out of all the metal sheets. It was so strong that when he went on his rampage, 200 round of ammunition were fired at it and 3 external explosives which did absolutely nothing to the tank.
-Most bizarre about this was that it had no windows. Instead the bulldozer was fitted with several video camera which were positioned on the outside but also secured with bullet proof glass + compressed air nozzles to blow dust off the camera. The cameras were then hooked up to bulky computer monitors inside the tractor where he was able to see the outside world.
-Inside were also fans and an airdonitioner that kept Heemeyer cool while he drove. Ports were designed fitted for rifles to shoot out of. (though he mismeasued them making them completely ineffective)
After a year and a half of building this in secret, he was now finished and ready to go on a rampage.
THE JUNE 4 DEMOLITION:
On a sunny day on June 4 2004, Marvin was ready to strike back. He entered his bulldozer and closed the lid. By the design of this, there was no way to exit once the lid was shut (the lid would require a crane to remove). Marvin had no intention of leaving this vehicle.
After starting the engine, he drove his armored car right through the wall of his former business to the outside. He had a very specific agenda and map to follow in his course of destruction.
Soon after busting through the small building he made his way to the concrete plant which was on the same property. He made a turn toward the plant and plowed right through it with his killdozer as part of his revenge with the concrete plant.
Now that the concrete plant was checked off his list, he made a turn directly toward the Town Hall (the perfect place to attack considering he was constantly at fight with the town and zoning board) He also plowed down a playground that sat in front of the town hall as well as a library which was attached.
After that his next stop was the office of the local newspaper. His bone to pick with them was the fact that they had written editorial stories about him not painting him in a favorable light.
Once he created destruction at the newspaper office, he move toward the home of Thelma Thompson, 82. Why?
Her husband was the former Mayor “Dick Thompson” who was now deceased since 2001(not from Marvin, he was already dead before this rampage began).
Thompson served as major when Heemeyers fight with the city began, so by default he was part of the problem for Marvin. To get revenge, he drove to his home where his Widowed Wife, Thelma Thompson was living, and drove the bulldozer through that house as well.
That family also owned a lot of the land, and always had money. So in some aspects they were a monopoly to the town. They had multiple generations of family that owned land before them.
Somewhere in the process of all this he did drive to a propane tanks , not sure if it was a propane tank factory, or a storage are for the tanks…but he drove to this lot and shot his gun from the holes inside the kill dozer in hopes of creating an explosion. However, due to the mismeasurements of his design, the bullets shot did not make it through the holes so they would rickshay Back inside.
Finally Marvin makes his way to a hardware store to plow his bulldozer through. This was the last stop for his machine started to smoke due to either coolant leaking or antifreeze. While plowing through very slowly, his bulldozer got stuck because the floor collapsed in the shop, making his vehicle get stuck in the basement level. Eventually he was trapped, a truck blocked him in and his bulldozer could no longer move. The owner of the hardware store was part of a lawsuit with Marvin, so thats why this was a stop on his revenge path.
Police and helicopters swarmed the area. It took HOURS for them to remove the lid of the tank to get access to Marvin.
When they finally got inside, he had been dead. Marvin took a pistol and shot him self in the head.
Since Then:
Most of the damage n Grandby had been rebuilt , including the town hall.
What happened to the bulldozer?
Well to keep people from wanting pieces for true crime memorabilia and so on, it was taken apart and sold for scrap metal, never to be seen again.
To some, Marvin has become a “hero” for standing up for his beliefs and going against the man. He took own the establishment head on and when he couldn’t win, he turned to demolition.
Though I LOVE people who want to destroy corruption and I do like the concept of vigilante justice ….however…
MARVIN SAID THIS IS WHAT GOD WANTED AND HE WAS DOING THE LORDS WORK!!!! He claimed “God Built me for this Job”
Good bye. When people act crazy in “the name of god” or “religion” I immediately shut them off. He probably would have been a crazy Trump supporter too.
Good for him for getting revenge on the town that screwed him over… I think more people need to act out as such in the fight for equality and demolishing capitalism (which will never happen, were all fucked)
It should be noted that there were no fatalities, and he did in fact go out of his way to ensure that nobody would be hurt, but just that property would be destryoed.
During the rampage, police were able to figure out the locations he was heading to (the killdeer moved incredibly slow). The town was notified and many people evacuated their homes, town hall, etc, to eliminate any fatalities. In the space he was residing, he had hand written notes all over the walls, some of these notes specifying the people and placed he was going after, so it gave the police a leg up during the chase.
Concrete Plant
Town Hall
Newspaper Office- They made editorial stories against him
A Former Judges Widow’s Home-
Hardware Store- Man who owned it was part of a lawsuit involving Marvin
And other homes
13 buildings destroyed
$7 Million in Damage
Subscribe/Follow
