Matthew Hoffmann: Confession of burglar who murdered 3 and raped girl

Extracts of murderer and rapist Matthew Hoffmann's disturbing confession have been released to the public, in which he details how he dismembered the bodies of his victims and disposed of them in a tree.

The grizzly confession was given to the police so that Hoffmann, from Ohio, could escape the death penalty and give the victim's relatives some closure.

It reveals details of how he only intended to burgle the house, as well as shocking details of how he murdered the two women and the 11-year-old boy.

The 30-year-old claimed he did not mean to hurt anyone and picked the house at random because it had an open garage and no neighbours close by.

The house, which belonged to Tina Herrmann, was targeted by Hoffman in November and ended in a frenzied knife attack on Miss Hermann, her friend, her 11-year-old son and even their dog.

Though the 13-year-old girl was spared, he kidnapped her and raped her several times over four days, keeping her bound and gagged in his leaf-lined basement.

The details of his crime, for which Hoffman will spend the rest of his life in jail, emerged on Monday after the Columbus Dispatch obtained his confession.

In the four-page document, offered days after the crime to avoid the death penalty, he said: 'I did not enter the house to kill those people. I did not know a single one of them. I did not plan for any of this to happen. I did not want to kill anyone.'

Hoffman entered the house of Miss Herrmann, 32, and her two young children on 9 November, 2010 after sleeping rough across the street the night before.

According to his confession, he noticed the cars were gone and slipped through the garage door simply to steal any valuables.

'I did not find anything of any real value. I was getting ready to leave as I had been there approximately an hour, but someone pulled into the driveway.'

Hoffman hid in a bedroom when he was confronted by Tina Herrmann.

Armed with a blackjack and knife, which he claimed he brought 'for a certain amount of intimidation', the two fought and he knocked her to the bed face down.

He hit her a couple of time in the head with the blackjack but nothing happened.

Survivor and victim: The 13-year-old girl was discovered bound and gagged in a Mount Veon basement. Tina Herrmann's body was found in a tree

Killed: The bodies of Kody Maynard, 10, and 41-year-old family friend Stephanie Sprang were found wrapped in garbage bags

He said: 'I tried to just knock the first woman out so I could escape but this was not working. It was not doing the job.

'A second woman showed up and things quickly spiralled out of control. They kept escalating and I was panicking.'

The second woman was Miss Herrmann's friend Stephanie Sprang, 41, who started yelling at him.

Grabbing his knife, he stabbed Miss Herrmann in the back twice as she lay face down on the bed.

Prisoner: Police gather evidence from Hoffmann's House in Mount Veon, Ohio, where he held the 13-year-old girl captive in his basement, repeatedly raping her, for four days

Miss Sprang ran screaming into another room. Hoffman found her and stabbed her several times in the chest, then he retued to Miss Herrmann and stabbed her several more times.

'I could tell that both women were now dead,' he said in his confession.

'At this time I was in a total state of shock. I wandered around the house slowly coming to the realization of what I had done and how bad it was.

'During this time I killed the dog because it would not stop barking.

'I decided to process the bodies and dispose of them inside of a tree that I knew was hollow.'

Hollow tree: Police suggest that the killer used a haess to raise the bodies to a hole at the top of the tree and dump them inside

Grisly discovery: The beech tree in the Kokosing Lake Animal Preserve shows the square cut that police made to find the bodies

After dismembering the bodies, using garbage bags from within the house to place them inside, he was loading them into the Jeep when the children came home from school.

He said: 'I confronted the children, and the girl instantly ran to a bedroom. I stabbed [11-year-old Kody Maynard] in the chest a couple times.'

But when he was face-to-face with the 13-year-old girl, who has not been named for legal reasons, he said: 'I could not bring myself to kill her.'

Considering several options, including disposing of the bodies in a nearby pond or buing the house down, the unemployed tree cutter decided to put them in the tree.

The 30-year-old then took the girl back to his home near down town Mount Veon, Ohio, where he held her hostage for nearly four days.

During that time he sexually assaulted her, kept her hands and feet bound with duct tape, and forced her to sleep on a bed of leaves.

The confession focused mainly on the four days he spent at his home with the girl, during which time he said he cooked her burgers and slept with his arm around her.

The basement itself, the Columbus Dispatch reported, was covered with leaves held to the walls with plastic bags, reflecting Hoffman’s obsession with nature.

The man drew the attention of police the day after the murders when he retued to Herrmann's home to bu it down. Authorities were already at the house, having been alerted to a crime there by a neighbour.

Items found in Miss Herrmann's home led them to surveillance video at a Walmart of Hoffman buying trash bags and tarps. On a Sunday moing, four days after the murders, police stormed Hoffman's home and found the young girl.

Hoffman later showed police where he had hidden the bodies, along with the family dog. Using a rig-and-pulley system, the Dispatch reported, he concealed them in a 60-foot tree in the Kokosing Wildlife Area near Fredericktown.

Father of the two children Larry Maynard described the killer as a 'monster'.

Hideout: Hoffman slept rough the night before the frenzied attack and watched Tina Herrmann's house, pictured, before attempting to burgle it

During his trial, the raped girl said in a statement read out in court by a prosecutor: 'This is so sickening, to know you even had the guts to do this.'

Malek and Knox County prosecutor John Thatcher said they weren't sure why Hoffman killed the other three but not the girl.

'I don't think he gave any other reason other than he couldn't bring himself to do it,' Thatcher said.

Prosecutors decided not to pursue the death penalty in exchange for Hoffman agreeing to plead guilty and telling authorities the location of the remains, which otherwise would have been difficult to find, Thatcher said.

'He knew the families needed closure, that they deserved to have their families back and properly buried,' Mr Malek said.