After a while women in the area were reported missing, including barmaids, former girlfriends and his wife. When two Bexar county sheriff’s deputies came to question him in 1938, Ball pulled a handgun from his cash register and killed himself with a bullet through the heart (some sources report that he shot himself in the head). If he were tried and convicted of the murders, he would have surely been sent to the electric chair.
A handman that conspired with Ball, Clifford Wheeler, admitted to helping Ball get rid of the bodies of two of the women he had killed. Wheeler led them to the remains of Hazel Brown and Minnie Gotthard. Wheeler told authorities that Ball murdered at least 20 other women, but the alligators had disposed of any evidence. There has never been any firm evidence that the alligators actually ate any of his victims.
There were few written sources from the era which could verify Ball’s crimes. Newspaper editor Michael Hall investigated the story in depth in 2002, and wrote up his findings for Texas Monthly.
The film Eaten Alive by Tobe Hooper was inspired by Joe Ball.