Frozen Body Leads Cops To A Trail Of Death | The New Detectives | Real Crime

Police find a

frozen

body

in the Arizona desert The chilling discovery sends investigators searching for more victims in a small town A brutal murder and a killer who could be anywhere when all

leads

are exhausted The investigation focuses on a Blurry surveillance photo when young mother disappears Detectives are left with few clues, but little by little the evidence begins to point to a dangerous and twisted predator. A lack of

leads

can cool a hot investigation, but there is no statute of limitations for murder. It can take months or even years before forensics can start a fire.

These unsolved cases On June 3, 1991 investigators from the Costa Mesa, California Police Department stopped at an abandoned car on the Corona Delmare Highway. They were responding to a call about a missing person. Denise Hubert, 23 years old, no one had seen her or heard from her for a long time. Almost 24 hours and that wasn't like Denise's best friend had found a car on the side of the road while she was looking for her. Investigators examined it closely, but other than a flat tire, nothing appeared to be missing. The only personal item they found was a pair of panties in the front seat.

Denise preferred to drive without them, although nothing in the car tipped investigators off to what had happened. Ron Smith concluded that Denise got into trouble shortly after going off the road, but we thought it was unusual about the scene and we became concerned. From the beginning it was that very close to her car there were emergency call booths, there were pay phones, there were convenience stores open all night, none of which Denise went to to call her parents or ask for help, we knew immediately that something was happening. a young lady something was wrong the last person who saw Denise was his date the night before she left him after a concert Denise never came home brilliantly popular fresh out of college she wasn't the type to worry her parents when leave Without a call or note, her family and friends began searching for her the next morning, after recovering her car, Costa Mesa police launched a massive search for Denise Huber, they notified law enforcement agencies across the country and followed every clue, every major distribution with these Fers Denise's friends and family put up posters and appeared on news shows asking for information as the months and years went by, the leads dried up, but the police kept Denise's case open and As actively as possible, every day we did something with the Denise Huber case.

We would review old leads, review old reports again, look at the photographs one more time. We never gave up even though we never had anything good to work with after 3 years. No one could tell her grieving family and friends. What had happened to her contact Denise Huber had simply disappeared while, more than 1,000 feet away, in Arizona's Prescott Valley, authorities wrestled with her own mystery. On July 9, 1994, a woman went to buy paint at the house of a man she met in a meet-and-greet exchange. Hello, while she was waiting for him, she noticed a lock rental truck and cans of paint and chemicals cluttering her garden.

She thought that They seemed out of place for such a respectable neighborhood and she wondered if some suspicious law was being broken. She called a friend who worked for the police. Her friend thought it sounded like a clandestine drug lab that the police find in the most unlikely places. She sent investigators from the Yavapai County Sheriff's Department to check it out. The rental truck with the California tags appeared not to have been moved. months, the electrical cord coming out of it and the paint cans everywhere reinforced the idea that this could be a mobile drug lab, the tag check showed that the truck had been stolen, armed with a warrant, The police cautiously opened the cargo door inside. a freezer ready, guys, we are opening it not knowing what it might contain, they dressed in protective equipment, plastic bags obscured the contents, but at the bottom of the freezer there was a puddle of

frozen

blood, carefully moving the bags to the side, the officers They expected to find nothing.

More than a deer, Lt. Scott Mher initially discovered a horrible mystery when we opened the black bags and could tell that we had a human, a frozen

body

with handcuffs, behind the back, ice crystals, it was Grim, the owner of the house I hadn't done it yet. he returned, so police ran the license plates of the white van that was also parked in the driveway. The owner was identified as John Joseph Falero. After an hour, Falero and his mother stopped at the house. Sheriff's deputies detained Falero, accusing him of stealing the rental van. They were eager to know more about the body in the freezer.

Ms. Falero, who lived next door, told

detectives

that her son was a house painter, which explained the paint cans. She said the truck had been parked there for about 2 months. She didn't know anything. the freezer or its contents, except that the electricity at John's house had been turned off for a day and he had asked to run an electrical cable from his house to the truck at the police station. Falero was polite but uncooperative, refusing to answer questions and being asked to see his attorney without the help of his investigators suspects would have to rely on physical evidence at the scene to identify the body in the freezer and find out how it got there to answer any questions. question they charged pomero with murder first of all we need to have a video the next day order in hand investigators entered falo's house hoping to find information about the victim in the freezer in his frozen state they couldn't even discern the gender of the victim looks through these things in the chair with which the house was filled with phallus his belongings this was the house of a man who never threw anything away.

I think it's something interesting. This piece will make 52 layers viewable on mobile devices or the big screen, all free, no subscription required. If Clues were here, it would be difficult. to find After more than 2 weeks of searching, investigators found several promising clues, the first was a set of handcuff keys that matched the Vitim's handcuffs. Well, the next clue took investigators by surprise. Two complete Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department uniforms in the deputies' garage. They found two boxes marked Christmas, but there was nothing cheerful about them inside. Officers found blood-stained women's clothing and a bloody hammer and nail puller.

They also found a pair of women's shoes. Their backs were very scratched as if they had dragged the woman who wore them. Get a couple of bags. here's a shot of this hammer and that wasn't all we located numerous female IDs that included soul security cards. I think some driver's licenses and other IDs obviously raise concerns that maybe we would have additional victims. Yavapai County police had to face the same situation.

real

possibility that John falero was a serial killer more put there Arizona investigators investigating a murder had every reason to believe there may be more than one victim to test that theory investigators brought in kadaver dogs to locate more bodies in the owned by John Fero, dogs trained to detect the slightest smell of decomposition alerted their handlers several times.

The officers dug up each location and still found nothing, but they never completely abandoned the suspicion that the Killer had attacked before it was over. After receiving that documentation from Costa Mesa police, police kept track of each piece. ID cards found in the Christmas boxes, to her relief they discovered that every woman was alive and accounted for, except one from Costa Mesa, California, her name was Denise Huber to confirm her identification. Yavapai County Technician Mike Winnie took a fingerprint from the defrost victim. and he compared it to the one printed on Denise Huber's California driver's license.

The prince compared Huber's identification as the victim to Arizona authorities. The name meant nothing, but to Costa Mesa Detective Ron Smith, it was the news he had waited three anxious years to hear the call. What I received from Lt. Scott Masher of Yavapai County was that he thought he perhaps had a body identified as Anise Huber and asked us if we were familiar with the new hu. Well, of course, I almost fell off my chair when you mentioned the name. They had found her, investigators in Arizona had to determine how she had been killed. Working with the frozen and decomposed remains presented a unique set of challenges for the Maricopa County medical examiner.

A problem in our environment to examine a frozen body is very unusual. We take care of 99%. Of the times with people who have been exposed to hot elements and that is more our area of ​​expertise than with someone who has been in a cold environment, it took about 2 days for the body to get to Tha where we were able to do the internal exam on Friday July 16th. 1994 Yavapai Detection Detective Scott Meser and Costa Mesa Detective Ron Smith along with other officers gathered at the medical forensic laboratory to observe the autopsy. I believe the cause of

death

was determined to be blunt force trauma to the skull resulting in multiple fractures to identify the murder.

Weapons investigators needed to evaluate the entire skull to see where and how the blows had been struck. They called forensic anthropologist Laura Fenti. How many days are we looking at here? Reconstructing a person's skull is very similar to doing a puzzle. Basically, you have about 50 pieces and you need to put them back into what you know is the correct composition. It took Fenity 2 days to reconstruct the skull without losing sight of the fact that this victim was once a person and I remember standing in this very room thinking to myself. How did you come to my sphere?

This is not right, it is not natural for you to be here. She determined that the victim had suffered more than 35 lightning strikes to the head. The wounds were consistent with the hammer and nail puller taken from the box in Fero's garage. To be sure that the laboratory performed tests, technicians were able to establish a DNA profile from the blood residue on the nail puller. . It matched the DNA profile taken from the victim's own blood. The coincidence confirmed that they had found the murder weapon to build her case. Investigators had to retrace the events leading from the victim's abandoned car on a California highway to John Falo's freezer in Arizona, initially covered in terms of search awards, at this time it was very important for both agencies , the Aapi County Sheriff's Office and the Costa Mesa Police Department will work together and bring together the evidence from California and Arizona into one case, a strong case to successfully prosecute this.

The Costa Mesa Police Department collected information about Falo's activities during the time he lived in California. They found out that he had attended. The Los Angeles Sheriff's Department Reserve Academy, but failed to make the grade and dropped out after a few weeks. He kept his uniform that the police found in his house. Further investigation led

detectives

to a warehouse in Lagona Hills, 12 miles from where Denise Huber is vacant. The car was found. John Falero had stored some paint and supplies in the warehouse and then moved everything out when he left the area in August 1992. 13 months after Denise Huber disappeared, investigators thought it was likely that Falero had committed the murder here and hoped to recover forensic evidence. that would link the killer to the

crime

and determined where the Killer's trial would take place.

Police searched the unit for evidence of the

crime

using luminol to expose traces of blood applied to a surface and viewed under an alternative light source. Luminol reveals blood stains invisible to the naked eye, even traces left years before, we discovered that the warehouse was huge, but I wanted every square inch of luminol for blood, almost the last bottle on the last corner we looked, we sprayed luminol on the corner against the wall and everything Suddenly the luminol turned on, this bright glow showed us that we found what we were looking for. Technicians compared this blood to a sample taken from the victim in Arizona, matched the forensic analysis, and gave Costa Mesa Police Detective Smith the proof he needed. the case, forensic science by analyzing the blood was absolutely critical number one established that the crime occurred in California and that established jurisdictionalso POS positively identified that blood as Denise put Denise at that scene Pomero never confessed the forensic evidence spoke for him Investigators had successfully matched the blood in the California storage unit to the victim in Arizona and that placed the victim in a deadly proximity to John Falero.

Authorities believe Huber ran off the road with a flat tire when he saw his prey. Approaching under the guise of Lending a Hand, John Falero kidnapped Denise Huber in Costa Mesa, California, in the early morning hours of June 3, 1991. Balero murdered her; Some time later he hid her body in a freezer, transported it by truck to Arizona and stored it until the police discovered her crime. 3 years later, John Falero was sentenced. until

death

awaits execution on California's death row falero hid his crime by keeping the body close to him other murderers are not as intriguing but can be equally elusive it was a December afternoon in 1990 Peggy Phillips was wondering why her husband Dean was taking so long to close the laundromat they had in Ozona Texas, it was right next door but he was gone 20 minutes she found him lying on the floor bleeding and barely conscious very well, dear 725, the police and paramedics ran to save him Peggy He thought Dean must have fallen and hit his head, but the paramedics could see that it was not an accident.

Dean Phillips had been beaten almost to death. Peggy watched as the paramedics loaded her husband into the ambulance. It was the last time she saw him alive. Dean Phillips died early the next day. On the morning of December 26, the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. Investigators determined that Phillips had interrupted a robbery and had paid a high price for it. They only found one concrete clue: a single fingerprint taken from a box of coins on the floor. They sent the print to the Texas Department of Public Safety like small town police departments Throughout Texas, OzonaThis time police relied on the DPS crime lab for forensic services, although the Department of Public Safety found nothing.

The fingerprint on the coin box didn't match anything they had on file. News of Dean Phillips' death was spread by Oona Crockett County Deputy Sheriff Alton Davis. determined to catch the criminal who had destroyed the tranquility of this small town. We have a population of probably between 3 and 4,000 people, so it's a small town. Everyone knows each other and it was a

real

shock to the community that something like that. this could happen in Oona the community stepped forward to assist in the investigation a witness reported seeing two local men wearing bloody clothes KN Phillips was murdered a court order was obtained and his bloody clothes were confiscated before they had time to wash them taken for questioning The men claimed they were hunters and that the blood was from a deer they had poached last night.

Investigators were highly skeptical until they received confirmation from the DPS crime lab. Let's move on to the question of what time the blood was actually from a deer. 10:30 10:30 and the men's fingerprints didn't match the ones taken from the coin box at Phillips' Laundromat the first promising lead in the case came to nothing an employee at a convenience store right next door from the interstate gave investigators their next clue M, you have a couple of minutes I can talk to you, yes, a man came by an hour before the murder and asked where the laundromat was and we were just checking on a neighbor, she described it as stocky, with dirty blonde hair and a T-shirt with radio call letters, yeah, yeah, what.

The moment was that she was driving a beat-up blue van with a green door on the passenger side. It's possible there was a passenger in the van and then investigators hope to see the suspect on the store's surveillance tape. Okay, okay, okay, so have a good night. thank you very much but the security camera was old the man's face was blurry neither the DPS nor the FBI could electronically enhance the image the investigators were convinced they had the suspect on this tape but his image and their chances of finding him were slim. doing today as the investigation into the murder of Dean Phillips continues Witnesses reported seeing a strange blue van in town the night of the murder some thought they saw two people in it.

Sheriff Alton Davis believed Phillips' killer was a stranger passing through town. Right on Interstate 10 and pretty much in the middle of nowhere, this is the first one we've had where someone drove off the Interstate and murdered one of our local investigators. They knew the killer was probably hundreds of miles away. Every once in a while they would get the call, a pickup truck matching the one described by witnesses pulled over about 200M west of the town of Davis and rushed to the scene. We found an old light blue GMC pickup truck that had a dark passenger door.

We colored and took pictures of the truck. We talk to him. There was a Hispanic courier driving it who did not fit the description of our suspect. The case had reached another dead end as they reviewed the clues they had gathered so far. Investigators realized that all they had to go on was a blurry surveillance tape and the faded memory finger of a store clerk. They needed some way to turn these confusing clues into solid information. Then they remembered Karen Taylor, an experienced forensic artist with the Texas DPS Special Crimes Service. Taylor had worked with Ozona police on missing persons cases.

She is a pioneer in the art and forensic science of facial reconstruction. She develops vague descriptions of witnesses into recognizable faces of criminal suspects. My role is to take information from a crime that occurs and produce some type. of a visual image that can be published in the media and will hopefully generate additional information that can be used to connect the crime to the victim or connect the crime to the suspect. The Ozona police sent Taylor Stills to the videotape, but after she had evaluated the black and white photos and wasn't sure she could help, so I had to look at those still images to see what she could determine about the face, it was very blurry, the quality was pretty poor, so I could see that there wasn't much chance that we could electronically enhance that video and it would probably come down to me trying to make some kind of sketch based on what I could see.

Taylor knew that while not all characteristics may have been perfectly depicted, the sketch's resemblance to the suspect would be strong enough to assist in the investigation. After years of doing this, I have come to believe that the most important thing to capture on a face for a forensic artist to generate recognition is to obtain the correct proportions of each of the component parts of a face, each of the features, the eyes, the nose, the mouth, it's important, but it's not as important as the arrangement of those features on a face. Taylor wasn't sure the image had enough information to work with, so she noticed a feature that she had examined the store clerk, she had spoken to the suspect face to face.

Taylor hoped the employee could provide the missing details she needed to improve the image using still images from the video. I prepared as much of the drawing as I could, maybe 85%. I did and then faxed it to the witness. I spoke with her on the phone and she was able to make some changes. She said she wanted me to make the eyes look lighter and the lower part of the face look slimmer. Hey and I did it. We hang up. I spent about 15 minutes making those edits and then I forwarded it to her and she looked at it and said yes, that's right, so I was able to take advantage of her long distance information over the phone and using the facts here, he was the most likely. suspect in the murder of Dean Phillips, the Crockett County Sheriff's Office prepared a crime bulletin.

Karen Taylor's drawing of the suspect's face was circulated throughout the country and on every radio station where anyone could recognize the call letters on the suspect's shirt. Taylor's drawing represented the objective of the investigation. Last Hope, but when all the publicity produced no response, the Dean Phillips murder case came to a complete halt. First, the beating death of Dean Phillips seemed destined to remain unsolved. Sheriff Alton Davis and his team had exhausted their last leads, finally us. we discarded everyone we were getting and the lead stopped coming and we had nothing to work on and it more or less cooled down and we had to sit until we got another type of leads. 5 years came and went With no other lead or clue, but Peggy Phillips was determined to bring her husband's killer to justice, she contacted a TV crime show and asked if they had published her story in August 1996 Just over five and two years after Phillips was murdered, the television show aired the story of his murder and featured Karen Taylor's drawing that set phones ringing across the country as viewers called clues to The Ranger.

From Texas Jerry Burn answered the calls and led the investigation a lead led him to Paul Wesley Taylor, a convict at the Utah minimum security prison in Draper for Ranger Burn contacted the Draper prison and asked for Taylor's records and a photograph when he saw it, but Burn felt they had finally located their suspect. The photograph of Paul West Taylor was almost identical to a composite drawing that a DPS artist had made. In 1991, I initially felt it was too good to be true. I started changing the burn. I sent Taylor's records and fingerprint card to DPS.

They compared Taylor's right ring finger to the fingerprint on the coin box after years of no progress. This was a big step forward. Glad to hear it. Call Me Again Investigators returned to the original set of Clues looking for more connections to the suspect. They discovered that Taylor's brother worked at a radio station with the call letters seen on Taylor's shirt. They were now certain that Paul Wesley Taylor was involved with the murder of Dean Phillips but they wanted to know about the passenger in the van, a witness or possibly an accomplice to Phillips' murder. Taylor's arrest records showed that his girlfriend had been with him in the time of her arrest in Georgia Georgia authorities located the woman her responses filled in The remaining gaps in the case against Taylor told Ranger Burn that they had traveled through Texas on December 19, 1990 and that Taylor had stopped outside a laundromat and went inside, saw him fighting and he returned to the truck with blood on his shirt.

He certainly didn't know that anyone had been murdered. He never said if he killed him. She led investigators to a field where Taylor had disposed of her bloody clothes along with a stolen box of coins. They now had a credible witness who placed Taylor in the laundry room at the time of the murder Utah extradited Paul Wesley Taylor back to Texas on September 15, 1998 almost 8 years after the murder he pleaded guilty to the capital murder of Dean Phillips on the 21st was sentenced to life in prison forensic artist Karen Taylor had served a year of single blurry photograph in an image that helped unmask and arrest a brazen murderer when that photograph and drawing were presented they knew it was Paul Wesley Taylor that photograph and that drawing compound is what opened this case investigators speculate that Paul Wesley Taylor jumped the interstate in Ozona to get some food and gas due to lack of money Taylor had the idea to tear down the laundromat after closing time Dean Phillips was in the wrong place at the wrong time in other cases tragedy stalks its victims August 16, 1989 Joe Gilbreth finished work and arrived home in Villano Georgia, looking forward to spending the night with his baby Amber and his wife Nikia.

He realized that his wife's car was gone. It was strange. Nikia was usually home making dinner at this time when she walked in. I started to worry: Nikia would never let Amber sit in her pajamas all day and there was no way she would ever leave the baby alone in the house. The doors were open, it didn't look like they had been tampered with. K when when Nika The family told Joe that they had not heard from her. He called the police. The Walker County Sheriff's Department sent officers to investigate Che. The res and you don't see her and you're not Joe and his mother-in-law reported three missing. items: a blue telephone cord that had been torn from the wall, a quilt that had a sheet sewn into the side, and all of Nika's underwear based on what she found in the house.

Detective Pat Bedford believed that the disappearance ofNikia Gilbreth was more sinister than simple disappearance. This person's case was originally sent for investigation. My first impressions. Know?. They took her out of here tied. Someone was forcefully removing her from this residence. and there was lingerie missing makes you think we're dealing with another serious crime here check to see if anything is missing by any chance um I took a shower Joe Gilbreth told the police that the day had started like any other you know, I checked everyone's house and I was able to, the alarm went off at 5:30 Joe got up and got ready for work Nikia went back to bed and at 6:00 a. m.

The house was silent. Joe and the baby were the last to see Nikia. She parked at the house in case she could return, but Nikia never returned home on August 18, 1989, the day after she disappeared. The Walker County Sheriff's Department had little to go on. We have a tragedy here. We have a problem. At first it wasn't good. clues to follow up uh her car had not been located she had not been located uh she didn't seem to have any leads when talking to the neighbors and uh searching the immediate area uh we didn't have anything at the time, but that soon changed when the mother Nika's car was found abandoned on a logging road half a mile north of the G Breath House.

Investigators hoped to find clues that would help locate her. 53 technicians lifted fingerprints all over the car, but they belonged to members of the Gilbreath family. Officers found signs that a second car parked next to Nikia was an ominous sign, but the tire track was not clear enough to photograph or print. Nika's mother noticed that the baby quilt that Nikia always kept in her back seat was missing and that was it, there was nothing at the scene. a clue as to what had happened to Nikia or where she might be now, her family still held out hope that she would return unharmed, although investigators believed she was a victim of foul play, they had no evidence or suspects that Joe would have happened a polygraph indicated he wasn't involved, all they had were some missing items and an abandoned car, but still no sign of Nikia. 2 days later, a boy collecting empty cans along the road made a crucial and gruesome discovery: the body was too decomposed for positive visual identification although it was a white woman Nika's size wearing the clothes and jewelry Joe had The described dental records confirmed everyone's worst fears.

The autopsy determined that Nikia had died of asphyxiation. The examination also revealed marks around her wrists and ankles. Marks that could have been made with telephone wire, but there was no other significant forensic evidence, no hairs or fibers. no fingerprints on the body anything that could dictate The next step of the investigation Investigators considered several suspects but none of them found dry leads the case went cold unfortunately We were going nowhere in the case, we had no good leads, there were no good suspects, no advice we got we did everything from roadblocks, uh, car to car, house to door, also searches.

You search the area thoroughly, we couldn't really locate anything. several months passed and we were not really making any progress in resolving this case. You can't let something like this continue. You have to be able to solve this case. Then, 4 months after Nikia Gilbreth disappeared, investigators learned of a similar case in nearby Gordon County. A young woman was kidnapped by an intruder while her son was sleeping for 14 hours, forced her to model lerie for him, and assaulted her. repeatedly, then brought her back home before police could identify the woman as Salent. The case took a strange turn in the investigation.

Nikia Gilbreth's death had led to a similar account of a woman's kidnapping, the connection was tenuous but it was their only lead 2 days after the assault, the woman's father reported to police that he saw a strange man leave a tree Christmas at his home when investigators ran the truck's license plate and discovered it was registered to James Ray Ward. He worked for a nearby well drilling company. The woman selected Ward's photo from a series of photographs. She remembered that during the day she was detained she told him that she was leaving. She hadn't had a chance to get her son a Christmas tree, officers arrested Ward a short time later, Ward pleaded guilty to rape and was just beginning a 20-year prison sentence as they investigated his whereabouts before of his arrest.

He learned that Ward had drilled a well in the Gilberts a year earlier and then returned to Cheze in July 1989, just a month before Nikia was killed. Ward's employers said they never sent the drillers back to verify that Wells Ward had acted on his own during the The similarities between the kidnapping of his rape victim and the kidnapping of Nikia Gilbreth provided police with their only lead when the Officer searched the home Ward shared with his wife and children and found a stash of women's underwear that did not belong to Ward's wife. Detectives also discovered a receipt for drilling a well in the name of the Gil Breaths, but it was much more than a receipt.

I had directions, the name of the road, the mileage that would have taken me directly to Gil Breaths' residence, the description of the victim I had written there. description of the match uh, including the age of a daughter the victim had, then we had our first direct link of the murder to a suspect. Investigators also found items missing from Gilbreth's home, the bottom of a bathing suit, a baby quilt, a quilt and a blue telephone cord. The guys got the phone wire, you know, to build the strongest case against Ward. Investigators needed to prove premeditation. They obtained a statement Ward had written about the kidnapping to which he had pleaded guilty.

They wanted to compare this writing sample with the incriminating notes written down. Gilbert's receipt found in his home was analyzed by document examiner Karen Scott. A handwriting comparison is basically a side-by-side comparison. I look for characteristics in the writing of one set and see if I find the same thing in the other set and I'm looking for things like how the letters are on the sheet of paper, how they are formed, how they are spaced, Scott looks for the idiosyncrasies, the little details that they give a person's writing its individual character, for example, the F in the word fine, is very uh, in short, at the bottom, the D and the word Way and side are written opposite to the form in which people are taught Personal first and then the round part, although this is not in itself unique to this writer, it is not the way it was taught to do it after comparing the note with Ward's known handwriting .

Scott was sure that both documents were written by the same person. Investigators then examined the bedspread and swimsuit bottoms found in Ward's home. Nika's mother provided her with the matching top, which she found. at Gilbreth's home because hundreds of identical swimsuits were made and sold, the prosecution had to prove that the bottoms found at Wards and the tops found at Gil Breaths were parts of the same suit to make that assessment, the laboratory had to compare the quantity. fiber wear on both parts of the suit. They concluded that the bottom coincided with the top. The suit belonged to Nikia Gilbreth.

The investigation focused on the other two items, the quilt and the baby quilt, even before she put them under a microscope. Trace Testing Technician Terry Santa. Maria recognized its importance. He knew that these types of quilts did not come commercially from the manufacturer with a sewn-in sheet, so he knew that the item had been altered by someone after determining that I then examined the baby quilt when I took the baby out. quilt I immediately recognized that this was made by Santa Maria called Detective Bedford these two items, the quilt and the blanket, were absolutely unique items, one of a kind, there was a direct link from the suspect's home to the victim, this evidence was completed In the case against James Ray Ward at Ward's trial, Nika's mother-in-law testified that she had sewn the sheet onto the quilt to cover the rough fabric and had woven the baby quilt for her granddaughter in the only way they could have gotten in. at Ward's house. her possession as if she had broken into the Gilbreath house and Nika's car and taken them.

Ward never confessed, but based on the evidence, investigators pieced together a scene for the murder on the morning of August 17. Ward watched Joe Gilbreth leave for work when he saw that he was safe, he entered the Gilbreath home and kidnapped Nikia. He believed he separated the telephone wires and the cord from the wall. I think he tied her up, he wrapped her in the quilt, and on his way out the door he also took a drawer full of her war lingerie as a gift from her. Trophy prosecutors called Ward a meticulous, organized stalker with a perverted mind.

Investigators speculated that he fantasized about the women he assaulted liking him, which could explain why he returned to place a Christmas tree on the doorstep of one of his victims' homes. Jurors convicted him of murder. and in July 1991, after deliberating only 3 hours, he was sentenced to death for murdering Nikia Gilbreth when clues disappear and an investigation stalls, which does not mean the case is closed to a homicide. Investigators have an arsenal of forensic techniques and all the time in the world to catch the killer look at this the keys here too when a wealthy family is murdered in their home it seems like a professional hit until investigators begin to suspect that it was actually the work of of a talented amateur's investigation into the drowning death of a woman in Pennsylvania generates repercussions all the way to North Carolina, where some dark secrets begin to surface.

Detectives on a murdered woman's case get more than they bargained for when they uncover a sinister family business. Every family has its problems. Every home has its secrets. when the skeletons in the closet are real forensics are asked to get to the bottom of that family PLS On Easter Sunday 1992 the uul family was finishing a weekend getaway at their beach house Dana, a college student from 20 years old, he said goodbye to his older sister Tiffany and his parents Dale and Glee, you have to go. Dana stayed the night with her girlfriend's family while the others made the 200m walk back to Fresno, see you home, have a nice FL, it was the last time Dana would see.

They were left alive 2 days later, when she couldn't reach her family by phone, Dana called a neighbor to check on her house. The neighbor, accompanied by the U's housekeeper, made a gruesome discovery and called the police. Mr. Ule lay dead on the floor, appearing to have been shot in the back of the head. When Fresno County Sheriff's Department investigators searched the home, they realized Dale was not the only victim. his daughter Tiffany and his wife Glee were also found dead, just as their father Tiffany had been murdered. ambush execution style with a single bull Bullet to the back of the head, but Glee knew what was coming, she looked like she had tried to run before the bullets to her back and shoulder stopped her.

Gunpowder residue on her sweatshirt told investigators that the killer had then shot her body at close range based on the victims' condition. Investigators knew that the Ules must have been killed almost immediately after returning from the beach. 2 days earlier, five spent bullets were collected from the crime scene and one more was found on Glee. The body was in the master bedroom. Investigators found an open box of 9mm ammunition and an empty gun box. The owner's manual showed the missing weapon was a Browning 9mm pistol, as much of the home was ransacked. Detectives first theorized it was an attempted robbery.

She was also a slug, but the evidence doesn't support that theory. It doesn't look like amateur work. There was no entrance. Many valuable items, including Dale U's gun collection, were left in the house rather than using pillowcases to collect the loot. Sheets were laid out. and loaded with worthless items like audio cassettes and coins for homicide detective John Souza even though the killers came and went without warning it just didn't seem like a professional robbery a good thief searches dressers and stuff starting from the bottom and going up that way he has never had to close a drawer he opens the bottom one he looks for it he opens the next one and they all stay open well here it was a combination of everything there was no pattern thank you very much the crime had been Although many neighbors were in their backyards theEaster Sunday, no one noticed anything strange in the Ule home nor did they hear gunshots.

Given the amount of foresight that must have been put into the murders, the detectives could not rule out a professional hit nor could they overlook the possibility that someone return to finish off the only survivor of the family, Dana U? I'm glad I came back from school and met with the investigators. If she feared for his life, she was hiding it along with his pain. I really appreciate you telling him that. that his family is dead his whole family not a tear and I was surprised I'm doing well I'll give him the benefit of the doubt maybe he's in shock he told the police that his mother had once worked for the Central Intelligence Agency his father , owner of an aircraft dealership, had a reputation as a ruthless businessman.

The FBI, as Dale's $8 million fortune grew over the years, it seemed likely that he had made some enemies. Investigators delved into the family's personal and financial background and searched for dark secrets. It was discovered that Glee's story as a CIA translator was uneventful, and while it seems like a lot of people didn't like Dale Ule, no one had a motive to kill him and his family. What is this? Our lab technician, Dana, was asked to inspect the house to keep an eye out for Something Missing, as you can see the blood stains here. We're not sure whose blood it was.

Detectives noted that he seemed unaffected by the blood-stained carpet, but he became outraged when he saw that investigators had damaged a lamp. What happened here? Their people? he did this immediately after the funeral he started spending money he lavished his girlfriend with expensive gifts and bought himself a $130,000 plane it was suspicious behavior but Dana had an alibi during the murder he said he had been away with his girlfriend's family for 4 hours The girl's father, an FBI agent, confirmed whether he could stand to make millions of dollars from the death of his family, but his perfect alibi meant he couldn't have been the shooter.

Detectives hoped forensics would help figure out who he was, but there was little. to continue there are no footprints or fingerprints even the casings had been removed the only physical evidence was the six 9 mm bullets fired at the crime scene all hope of solving the case was in the hands of ballistics experts from the Sheriff's Department Fresno County crime lab determined that the bullets came from the ammunition box found on the victim's nightstand; identical scratch patterns told investigators that all six bullets had been fired through the same barrel, but when these markings were compared to those on a Browning pistol like the one stolen from the U.

Investigators at the house found an obvious discrepancy: scratches indicating that the twist rate did not match. Twist speed is the distance it takes a bullet to complete a single rotation. The Browning has a twist velocity of 10 inches, but the killer bullets showed a velocity of 12 inches. To me, criminalist Alan Buro could not have been wrong when he discovered that that ended the problem, it was not a Browning pistol that fired the murder bullets, but these were not the only marks on the bullets, each of the six bullets had deep scratches . Baffled by these peculiar markings, he had never seen anything like it before, although he had about 24 or 25 years of experience.

Enlargements of the bullet marks were sent to police laboratories across the country, but none were familiar with the etchings or the unusual velocity. Turning around, I found that the Six Bullets had been fired, but no one had heard the shots. Unusual markings on the gun's barrel had etched a mysterious signature into the resulting bullets, suggesting the gun had perhaps been modified by a silencer, but the sheriff's department had little experience with them. I have never come across anyone who has used a silencer, um silencers, I don't want to say that they are used and you see them a lot on television, but I think it's more of a dramatic movie than, actually, that in real life silencers don't they use crimes. and that was unusual in itself before Souza had only theorized that murder was the motivation if a silencer had been used.

He now he had the physical proof. You have a silencer. You have a murderer who came to the house to kill people. was the only purpose after their ballistic analysis researchers studied the microscopic residue from the Glee sweatshirt. It's common to find metal debris near close-range shots, but this one contained an unusual mix of rubber steel wool and bright yellow fibers. The forensic team was unable to identify the source. of these materials but they knew that they had somehow been used to modify the weapon. Their findings corroborated the silencer theory. They showed that on Easter night someone had entered the Ule house with a deadly agenda, ransacked the house to make it look like robbery and stole the victim's gun to throw off detectives, but he had used ammunition he found in the house and that meant the killer would have had to know there was a box of 9mm ammunition hidden in Dale U's nightstand.

Only a handful of people had intimate knowledge of the house and three of them were dead detectives. He dug deeper into Dana's background. College classmates in Santa Clara described him as a pre-clean loner obsessed with wealth, so it was strange that they thought he had been best friends with a student named Joel R who was almost expelled from school for steal furniture Joel seemed defensive with investigators reporting that he told them he barely knew Dana. His whereabouts on Easter Sunday could not be confirmed. Look, I already told everyone. They already know it. I don't know anything about him.

Dana's surveillance showed that Joel moved into the Ule house. months after the murders and lived there until the following October, during which time Dana paid his friend's bills and treated him to thousands of dollars in helicopter lessons, but when Dana was asked about Joel, he denied knowing him, the Detectives had caught both bald young men. Face to face lie, they needed to find out what else they could be lying about more than a year after the triple homicide of a wealthy Fresno family. The detective still did not have enough evidence to prove that Dana Ule and Joel Ravich were involved and that the couple was well aware of that fact when Dana returned to Santa Clara the following spring, they communicated only through pagers and payons.

Dana was skilled at avoiding detectives. Dana was always looking over his shoulder, very cautious. She was going to the Jet Center at the San Jose airport. and they had isolated booths, paid phone booths and most of the calls were those and you couldn't even stand outside the booth and hear what was being said. Joel wasn't so careful, they heard him tell Dana that he was worried. What investigators might have on them was unfortunately not enough to link the young men to the murders. Investigators obtained a search warrant for a duplicate pager so they could monitor Joel's pages.

Weeks passed without any suspicious calls. Then they will find out who he is. On October 19, 1993, Joel received a page from a man the detectives knew very little about. His name was Jack, puns, okay, there it is, he and Joel used to go target shooting together. H admitted that just 11 days before the Ule murders he had bought a feather industry. 9mm semi-automatic rifle, he said he bought it to kill an opossum, detectives thought it was a strange choice of weapon and when they asked to see it, Pont said the gun had been stolen if investigators could somehow link the missing rifle with bullets and waste. from the crime scene they could connect Ruch and Ule to the triple homicide.

H realized that he was involved in the murders and it became magazine evidence because he admitted that he bought the rifle from Joel. Days later, Joel punned that he had killed the ruler and I asked him to get rid of the gun. The puns threw her away. The murder weapon was missing, but another piece of the puzzle fell into place when investigators learned that Dana had purchased a book on how to build a homemade silencer. I bought the same books as him. He bought them and brought them home and of course I gave them to Alan Budro and he told me to make a silencer.

I listened to this book. Buo built a silencer according to the specifications in the book. Among the materials were tennis balls and steel wool that matched the residue found in Glee U.'s sweatshirt, but the real proof was in the shot that they would need the gun after interviewing firearms manufacturers throughout the night. the world. Researchers discovered that the rare Feather Industries rifle is the only 9mm made with a 12-inch twist rate even though it had no K. The Budro rifle could still test other weapons of the same model. He spent months tracking down 9mm pens with serial numbers close to the one recorded on p.

The barrels of these weapons would be almost identical. Budro's test shot the guns through sticky paper to trap them. any microscopic particle ejected through the cannon, this trace of evidence was compared to the residue found on Glee U's clothing, the unusual yellow fibers, rubber particles and steel wool were an exact match and it was not difficult to reasonably conclude that yes , there is a tennis ball. material on Mrs. U's sweatshirt and is consistent with the silencer I built based on Detective Susan's information the test bullets closely matched the characteristics of the assassin bullets the twist rate was correct the deep scratches were almost identical to the assassin bullets and eventually the weapon extruded the same residue that was found near Glee Ule; no other type of weapon could have matched so closely.

In March 1995, almost two years after the murders, arrest warrants were obtained for Dana Ule and Joel R. Here is the plan based on their The extensive investigation IV had finally pieced together all the hungry story of her father's fortune Dana conspired with Joel a year earlier to shoot his family and make it look like a robbery in return Dana would split the $8 million inheritance with him while Dana established her Perfect Alibi 200 miles away distance Joel slipped into the Ule house with the spare key, shot Dana's sister and mother first and then waited for Dale. They thought that without the gun they couldn't link them to the murders, but they just as cleverly planned Dana. and Joel's designs were not bulletproof, neither confessed in May 1998.

Ule and Ruch were convicted of three counts of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison in Ule's case. Growing suspicions undermined a secretive conspiracy elsewhere in a murder investigation. was sparked by an innocent comment County 911 on November 7, 1994, Pennsylvania police responded to a 911 call from a distraught man named Timothy B, calm down sir, calm down, what's his address? Lee, we have a detail in Ross Township, it's a white woman found in a hot tub his wife Maryanne had lost consciousness in the hot tub they couldn't resuscitate her the police arrived and saw the paramedics trying to revive her what happened tonight their efforts failed is she going be fine? what was I inside her she was out here in the jacuzzi and I saw her and her heart just stopped when they rushed her to the hospital.

The 35-year-old woman was pronounced dead on arrival. She had an alcohol concentration of 22 in her bloodstream. I'm sure it is. Yes, I appreciate it. more than double the legal limit for intoxication if I knew my wife drank. Baskowski told the nurse that Maranne had been drinking heavily and that he attributed the drowning to her alcoholism. He cut back a little and she just didn't. You have it in praise. Accidental death cases in the county are police matters, so as technicians processed the scene, investigators questioned Bow's parents, who had been called in to watch the children while Timothy was in the hospital.

Well, it's a shock, it's really a shock. Father Basow made the comment that this was not the case. The first time his son suffered such a tragedy, his first wife, Elaine, had died 4 years earlier, almost the day Bosowski returned from the hospital, investigators were waiting for him. Bosowski described the incident throughout the day and into the evening he estimated that Maranne drank. between 13 and 15 cans of beer around 11:30 that night the couple drank a bottle of wine. Maryanne was an alcoholic, her husband said. Bosowski claimed that Maranne stayed in the hot tub after he got out of her and the next time he saw her he said she was lying.

On her side, in the water, detectives searched the house and found beer in the refrigerator and acontainer with empty cans. Hey, but these cans were completely dry inside and had obviously been collected for several days. The cans that had been opened that night would have still contained something. liquid, okay, we'll pack some, the evidence contradicted Bow's claim that Maranne had consumed beer after beer well into the night. They also learned that a friend of MaryAnn's had spoken with her on the phone for an hour and a half that same afternoon. Friendch said Maryanne didn't seem drunk the more detectives learned, the more they suspected Ms.

Bosowski's death was not an accident, but a case of deadly deja vu. If Maryanne Bosowski was murdered in her hot tub, Pennsylvania detectives had very little physical evidence to prove. If no signs of violence were found in or around the bathtub, all they really had were some contradictory statements. Timothy Bosowski agreed to go to the police station for further questioning with Detective Jimmy Fedck. His demanding story seemed prepared, one of the things he liked most. consistent with their times too consistent 10 to one i did this uh marann ​​did this at one to 8 minutes five after one i was putting on my shoes this interview this afternoon okay while baskowski was telling his story the detectives noticed a scratch on his neck could you tell me how you knew my wife and I went on a cruise and they asked him to take off his shirt take a look we might even want to take a picture of him.

On his back they saw a pattern of scratches from Bosowski. He explained that he and Maryanne had been on a cruise recently while he was in the bathtub, he had asked her to scratch his sunburned back given the suspect's pale skin and deep grooves, the explanation seemed implausible, okay, that's it. Those are some scratches, Tim, they look like marks from a struggle When investigators questioned Bowski about his first wife, his behavior drastically changed the PR of being married to this lady, that's right, uh, no, I'd rather not discuss that at all, yeah okay, he cut the interview short and demanded a lawyer without enough information to stop him, he was free to go, he would like to comment that all investigators immediately contacted the police in Greensboro, North Carolina, where bosowski and his first wife had lived, They discovered some striking similarities between the two.

Mrs. Bosowski Baskowski had met both wives, Maryanne and Delain, at church. singles groups you already saw this, yes they both worked as religious school teachers, yes they were exactly the same weight, good time, even more chilling were the similarities between their deaths, according to North Carolina police. Bosowski had called 911 on a Sunday night in November. just as he had done in Pennsylvania, paramedics arrived and found Elaine on the bathroom floor with her husband attempting CPR, okay sir, we're here, we'll ask you some questions about what happened last night. Baskowski claimed his wife had been drinking heavily that night and she fell unconscious. she in the bathtub and she drowned do you know where to listen to music?

She was on tape, although North Carolina detectives were suspicious, they did not have enough evidence to disprove her husband's account. The CPR cause of death was left blank on the death certificate, but Bowski never appeared. accused I tried to get him to stop, but I mean now, 4 years later, detectives in Pennsylvania were faced with the possibility that their case would end the same way to take to trial you need more than just suspicion you need you need a case that You have to gather the evidence and everything has to be there and they just didn't have what they needed, although the strange circumstances of his wife, with drowning deaths, pointed to foul play, it would be a challenge for investigators in Pennsylvania to differentiate an accident from a murder, especially when there were no Witnesses, unless MaryAnn's body had a compelling story to tell.

Bowski would have simply washed his hands of another suspicious death. The autopsy began with an inspection of the body. There was no evidence of external trauma, just some fresh bruises, but the bruises were not enough to disprove Baskowski's story. The paramedics could have caused them. The body was then examined for signs of drowning by Alagan County Coroner Sirel. Wet, it was evident that something had stopped MaryAnn's breathing, but it wasn't water. These lungs were gone. wet and heavy at all and if he had drowned in this bathtub, I believe that a good amount of water would certainly have entered the lungs, the victim had suffered hemorrhages in the eye and the back of the tongue, the muscle tissue of the neck had suffered deep bruising, these were all telltale signs of death by strangulation, the coroner concluded that after a tough struggle, someone had wrapped their hands around the victim's neck and squeezed the life out of him.

The findings in Pennsylvania caught the attention of Chief Medical Examiner John Buts. from North Carolina, wondered if Bow's first wife, Elaine, had also been asphyxiated 4 years earlier. The autopsy reports showed no indication that she was, but the original examiner may have missed the telltale signs that allowed Buz to get away with it. Ela's body had been buried for a long time, but the photographs remained Investigators hoped they would be enough to rectify a serious oversight 4 years after Elaine Bosowski died in her bathroom Investigators in North Carolina finally had the chance to show that had been murdered Coroner John noticed a strange mark on one of the photographs taken at her autopsy, one of the important pieces of the puzzle in this case, involve some distinctive bruising that was present on Miss Bosowski's lower chest, in the upper abdominal region.

This was a set of linear or elongated bruises illustrated in this photograph. Parallel bruises called railroad tracks match the shower door railing in Bow's bathroom at the autopsy. Its significance was overlooked, but learning how Timothy Baskowski had supposedly killed his second wife helped lead to clues to his first's death. She was literally squeezed to death with this bruise. occurred when the upper chest region of this woman's abdomen was pushed or compressed down in the shower and again it was our feeling or our conclusion that that is actually the mechanism of death according to what North Carolina investigators detectives in Pennsylvania had discovered.

Looking for more similarities between the two cases, they discovered that both of Bow's wives were planning to leave the marriage and neither had yet canceled their life insurance. Policy that named her husband as beneficiary made it seem that Lasowski felt that killing his wife would solve his financial problems. and romantics when history began to repeat itself with Maryanne he resorted to a plan that worked in the past thanks to the astute work of investigators in North Carolina and Pennsylvania the stage drowning of his second wife would be Bow's last in 1996 he was found guilty of the murder of Elaine in 1999 was sentenced to death for the murder of Maryanne Timothy Bow's murderous past finally caught up with him again in New Jersey police He would have to look back to solve a death in the family early Saturday morning, March 4, 1995 , a runner was running through Eastside Park While most of Patterson, New Jersey, was still sleeping, one of its residents had apparently chosen to practically sleep on the running

trail

, hey buddy.

You're okay, just a couple of feet stuck out of the sleeping bag. The runner wondered how the person could breathe and realized that the occupation was not engendering at all. Police confirmed that the body in the bag was dead. They interviewed the runner and found out. to look for evidence of a possible homicide, the victim was a young woman between 18 and 24 years old, she had been beaten. The inside of her sleeping bag was stained with blood, but not soap, suggesting that she was put there later, probably to be moved to this location. Detective Mike Ceri led in the investigation we knew it was a murder, we knew that wasn't the original scene, it was just that we were trying to find out who did it and that's where it all started.

Almost all homicide investigations begin with the victim in this case. If she had no identity, the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. The medical examiner found no signs of sexual assault. The parts of her clothing stained with her blood were carefully cut away and her blood was compared with that of the victim if part of her was not. Investigators disagreed, hoping it could be used against a suspected culprit, but all the stains matched the victim's blood. No skin or hair of any potential suspect was found at the New Jersey State Identification Bureau.

The victim's fingerprints were analyzed through an automated fingerprint identification system. He compared fingerprints from police files across the country in a matter of hours and found a match right in New Jersey. The victim was 18-year-old Tara Carter. Her fingerprints were on file because she had once been arrested for stealing from a store where her parents had stayed. changed state, but the police found her closest relative, her sister, they brought a photo of the victim, see if you see someone recognize, a friend came to help because she didn't dare to look at her, yes, they made the identification, not now There was no doubt, Terara Carter was dead.

Police learned that Terara said she was going to spend the weekend with her boyfriend. He was called by his original name. She didn't know his real name or where to find him. She also said Terara had been living with a family friend. widow named Celestine Payne and her children, perhaps they know more. Payne lived in a nearby neighborhood where she occasionally rented rooms in her house. The police visited her. Celestine offered to help in any way she could. She directed us to the bedroom area where Tara was. He slept with his two daughters and me and Detective Rees looked around, you know, it's common to look for phone books or anything with possible, you know, names of friends or anything, because we had nothing, we had nothing to go with. continue to resolve this. crime at that time oh no Wendy can't stand Tara Carter was treated like a member of the Payne family she was best friends with Wendy, Celestine's daughter, with whom she roomed until Wendy moved to South Carolina excitedly , we obtained this mask for the detectives. in the closet where Terara kept her belongings, yeah that's all I know, they didn't find anything to indicate that she was in any kind of trouble with her mystery boyfriend or anyone else when the pain couldn't offer any new information about the victim's boyfriend.

The original police Poli put the word. They realized they needed to talk to him while they looked for more information about the victim. The pain led them to the basement where more of Tera's things were stored. You know, I think Tera told me I got a call but they didn't know what they were looking for until they found it in one area drops of blood were splashing on the basement floor Detective Reus automatically told Miss Pay not to touch anything you know what the crime may have happened here and she uh again said well if it happened here I want I know, this is my house.

See these drops here. The number and position of the blood drops raised suspicions, but did not suggest that this was the crime scene. The researchers were not sure what the drops meant and a dripping spot could be seen. From the beam directly below was a stain, a blood stain, indicating that blood may have dripped from the floor above to the basement. Celestine Payne gave her consent for a more thorough search of her house, she said: I want to know about Do whatever it takes to find out that you did what you had to do while she was sent to the forensic team.

Detectives continued their investigation and returned to the victim's closet, which turned out to be directly above the blood-stained rafters. They found blood on the wall and floor of the closet along with blood-stained women's underwear and other clothing. It looked like a bloody murder, but investigators had to be sure: Can they pass me the CL bar? Please, samples were collected and sent to the New Jersey State Police central laboratory, where genetic markers are found in the blood. These proteins inherited from our parents were examined and do not change, although they are not as precise as DNA tests.

Testing for genetic markers is usually sufficient because certain markers are rarer than others. Forensic scientist Cynthia Mcweeny analyzed the samples from the closet and was able to determine. she that this bloodstain was consistent with only 3% of the black population which 3% included victim Tera Carter theEvidence showed that she had met her death inside the house. We only received a few questions. Celestine Payne accompanied the detectives to the station to be questioned if she told him that she last saw the victim at 11:00 a.m. m. on Friday, March 3, the day before her body was found. Terara said she was going to run errands.

Celestine and her son had their own errands to run and were away most of the time. That day, how did she get out to the backyard when Celestine returned? A man named Charlie Pincham was waiting on the porch. Pincham used to hang out with Celestine's daughter Wendy before she moved away and he had a habit of stopping by Celestine's house and hanging out with her. I don't know where he lived because he could have committed the crime while the pains were absent. Charlie Pinch's name was added to the list of suspects while Celestine answered questions. Investigators searched his home looking for more clues besides the bedroom closet.

Traces of blood were found in the kitchen. Drain pipes were removed and traps emptied to see what might have accumulated there. Nearly 100 items of evidence from there, including blood drips, a swab, disassembled the sink and removed it. The last thing that turned out to be skull fragments inside the sink trapped the toilet there. There was some hair and matter found in there, from there everything exploded. The investigation had already begun. The victim's boyfriend originally heard that police were looking for him and came forward along with an alibi. He was off the list of suspects at least for now.

That left the equally mysterious Charlie Pinch and Celestine grieving, but detectives didn't know where Charlie Pinch was and the forensic evidence didn't necessarily place Celestine at the scene when the murder occurred. This wasn't the first time the police had been to Payne's house while reviewing the case, Detective Sergeant Ronald Humphrey remembered a previous incident, there was a guy stabbed maybe about a year and a half before that, eh, Eugene Cooper. I remember Eugene lived there, but I never got to interview him, he was in intensive care. unit in the hospital with a stabbing and we couldn't talk to him when Cooper was released from the hospital, he refused to press charges and disappeared now, 18 months later, detectives tracked down Eugene Cooper to see if there was a connection.

Cooper told him that while he was living in the house, Celestine wanted him to sign her life insurance policy, but he didn't, but L said that shortly after Charlie Prickham attacked him, he said that when he was stabbed, Charlie was the one that stabbed him and, uh, Celeste, the pain that brought him to the point. Cooper didn't go to the police because he was scared and he wanted to put the whole ugly incident behind him. She picked a photo of him from some mug shots by looking at these photos. Because Cooper implicated him in this stabbing, it was more important than ever to locate him and now that Eugene Cooper was speaking he had a lot more to say and the case took another unexpected turn because he told the police that Celestine had set several fires in his home . for more information about the insurance money, he also admitted that he helped sell a move, a body, but it was not Tera Carter's body. terara Carter had been found dead in a sleeping bag and the investigation into her murder began to reveal other skeletons in Celestine's Closet Pay, hey, honey, according to Eugene Cooper, the death of Celestine's husband Alonso years earlier may not have been accidental.

Before his death, Alonso Payne had been suffering from severe hypertension and gout. His wife Celestine was taking care of him in 1991. His body was found in a field across town at the time Alonso's death was ruled accidental he was using drugs he walked away and collapsed now 3 and a half years later Eugene Cooper told him told New Jersey police that he had helped Celestine and her children Gump Alonso pay The body across town with Cooper's new information Detectives pulled out Alonso's medical records and the autopsy report and discovered that before his death he had been too ill to even get out of bed, much less cross town.

The autopsy showed drugs in his system. at the time of death were not those prescribed for his medical condition, but high doses of five types of tranquilizers and antidepressants, all prescribed for Celestine. Hey, can you check the bed? Yeah, sure investigators had enough to get another search warrant for Payne's house. They discovered that in addition to her husband Alfonso's policy and the fire damage payment, they also managed to obtain one for Eugene Cooper, even without his signature, it seemed that Cestine's payment could have killed her husband and once again, the insurance seemed to be the reason.

They also found a The policy on Tara Carter's life is like a pair of insurance. This was strange because, like Cooper, she was not related to pain. The policy provided a possible motive, but not enough evidence to arrest Celestine for murder. You have the right to speak to a loran she has present. you while being at this moment Charlie pincham had been found and arrested for stabbing Eugene Cooper, he finally admitted it saying that Celestine's pain put him in danger, then investigators asked him what he knew about Tera Carter's murder, he said that was there and tried to stop him but Celestine killed her, that's the only reason I did it after he admitted to helping her move the body using a car she rented.

They had what they needed to arrest Celese P. She put her hands behind her back and then tracked down her rental. Cynthia McWeeny examined the trunk for traces of blood and found nothing, but her job was not done. Her tests of the liner under the trunk mat gave different results. When I tested the line coating and got a positive result, I started to think maybe. The person had attempted to clean the area but had not made a Thor cut, as an analysis of genetic markers of the blood had previously shown that it belonged to the victim Tera Carter.

Her presence in the trunk of a car rented by Celestine Pay linked the suspect to the crime. You got a pretty good R. Despite the evidence, she adamantly denied any wrongdoing. I know he Li hoped her charm could mask her guilt law while Detective Michael Ceri didn't buy it he decided to answer any questions. Celestine was a devious woman, um, she would. Look at yourself and say, girl, I didn't commit this murder and I almost melted into you. You know I had nothing to do with this. She would never hurt anyone and she is using her children to kill people, including her own father, she is killing her friends. kill people in the family she's evil that's just a word for an evil woman she passed that evil on to her daughter oh no thanks investigators discovered that while Wendy pretended to be Tara's best friend, she also pretended to be terara at least the enough time. to sign a life insurance policy in Tera Carter's name oh yes, once it went into effect, Tera Carter's days were numbered, the unwitting victim lured into a false sense of security in the Payne home was marked for death, you look pretty good, it arrived quickly. pchum admitted to using a crowbar his body was hidden in the upstairs closet until it could be tied up and moved safely without detection finally forensics closed the case and even Celestine's pain couldn't deny it the blood stains the financial motive and The opportunity everything pointed to their daughter's pain Wendy and Charlie Pincham when faced with the evidence they negotiated Celestine's pain and Charlie Pincham was given life and Wendy Payne was given 28 years to solve some homicides investigators need look no further than her own home. the victim there, thanks, but just because a suspect is a relative doesn't mean the case will be solved relatively easily a killer in the home will take more care to cover his tracks it's up to forensics to make sure deadly secrets don't get buried in family plots