The Fox Hollow Murders on Hulu: The Story Behind Herbert Baumeister
Documentary series in four parts about the discovery of 10,000 bone fragments on a luxury property in Indiana
What is the series about?
The Fox Hollow Murders: Playground of a Serial Killer (Hulu, 2026) is a four-part documentary series that sheds new light on one of the most macabre murder cases in U.S. history. The series focuses on the wealthy businessman Herbert Baumeister , who in the 1990s was suspected of having killed a large number of young men on his 18-acre property, Fox Hollow Farm, in Westfield, Indiana. In the first episode, we follow cold case investigator Steve Ainsworth as he reopens the case to examine previously overlooked clues, including the possibility of an accomplice and missing videotapes from the investigation in the 1990s.
The real case
The real case of Herbert Baumeister began to unfold in 1994 when his 13-year-old son accidentally found a human skull in the woods behind the family’s luxurious home. Baumeister initially managed to explain away the discovery by claiming that the skull came from a medical skeleton he had inherited. However, the truth came to light in 1995 when Mark Goodyear came forward as a survivor. He identified 'Brian Smart' — a pseudonym used by Baumeister — as the man who had attempted to strangle him during a meeting in a gay environment in Indianapolis.
When the police finally obtained a search warrant for Fox Hollow Farm in 1996, they made a shocking discovery. Scattered across the property were more than 10,000 burned and shattered bone fragments, indicating that the number of victims was far higher than initially assumed. Among the identified victims was Michael Frederick Keirn , but many of the earthly remains have never been identified until now. Herbert Baumeister evaded prosecution by fleeing to Ontario, Canada, where he shot himself in July 1996.
Timeline of the case
The investigation has been marked by unanswered questions for decades. Although Baumeister is the primary suspect, the enormous amounts of evidence, including the discovery of shotgun shells and handcuffs on the property, have led to theories that he did not act alone. The new documentary series on Hulu shows how Hamilton County Coroner Jeff Jellison is now using state-of-the-art DNA technology to name the many anonymous victims whose bones were found in the woods behind the property.