Elizabeth Olten was murdered by Alyssa Bustamante, diary reveals confession

The brutal murder of Elizabeth Olten in 2009 still haunts a Missouri community, partly because of the crime itself, but also because of the motive.

The reason Elizabeth's teenage killer committed the crime was because she wanted to know what it felt like to kill.

The shocking case made headlines again earlier this summer when killer Alyssa Bustamante, who was 15 at the time of the murder, was denied parole.

The murder and Bustamante's attempt to get free ultimately forced lawmakers to change Missouri state laws regarding juvenile criminals convicted of murder when Governor Mike Parson signed a bill championed by Elizabeth's family.

This is what happened:

Elizabeth's murder

Patty Preiss called police on October 21, 2009, after her nine-year-old daughter failed to return to the family home in St. Martin's, Missouri, from a visit to a friend that evening. Police eventually found the young girl in a shallow grave with her throat slit. According to local station Fox 2, she had been stabbed and strangled.

The disturbing motif

Police were led to Bustamante after finding “written evidence” at the crime scene that implicated the teenager – a neighbor of Elizabeth's – in the murder, ABC News reported at the time. After an investigation, authorities also uncovered Bustamante's social media pages, which included references to wanting to know what it was like to kill someone, as well as a diary in which she confessed to the crime.

“I just killed someone,” the teenager wrote in her diary, according to ABC. “I strangled them, slit their throats and stabbed them, now they're dead. I don't know what to feel right now. [at the moment].”

She added: “It was amazing. Once you get over the 'oh my god I can't do this' feeling, it's quite entertaining. I'm a bit nervous and shaky at the moment though. Kay, I have to go to church now…lol.”

Investigators interrogated Bustamante for more than two hours while she confessed to the crime. The teenager's grandmother was in the interrogation room when her granddaughter confessed to the murder. The grandmother burst into tears and ran out of the room in shock.

According to the local KOMU, Bustamante was sentenced to life in prison in 2012 after pleading guilty to premeditated murder.

“The world has lost an innocent little girl who wanted to be a teacher and a veterinarian,” her family said in a statement, according to the news agency. They also said that Bustamante's conviction was “extremely difficult” for them to endure.

How the case changed Missouri law

A new law signed in the summer of 2024 is likely to finally seal Bustamante's life sentence.

Because Bustamante was a minor at the time of the murder, she was eligible for parole under a 2014 U.S. Supreme Court ruling. According to CNN, the court ruled 5-4 that no juvenile could be sentenced to life in prison without a chance of parole – even for murder. However, Missouri state lawmakers passed a law in 2021 saying that this sentence does not apply to juveniles who committed premeditated murder.

In 2024, Pason signed a bill extending this law to juveniles convicted of second-degree murder, according to local station ABC 13. Elizabeth's family had lobbied for this law.