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The Brighton Ax Murder
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The Brighton Ax Murder – CBS News
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Husband of woman murdered with an ax convicted 40 years after her death
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On a wintery night near Rochester, New York, retired Detective Marc Liberatore shows “48 Hours” how he helped bring one of the coldest cases in America to trial. On Feb. 19, 1982, police officers arrived at the Brighton home of Jim and Cathy Krauseneck and encountered a horrific scene.
The body of a 29-year-old mother Cathy Krauseneck dead in bed with an ax lodged in her head.
Det. Mark Libertore: It was a single blow to the head. And she died instantly according to the medical examiner.
Jim Krauseneck told police he arrived home from work and found his wife’s body. His 3-and-a-half-year-old daughter Sara was there and unharmed. Minutes later, he showed up at his neighbor’s house — seemingly traumatized — with Sara in his arms. The neighbor called 911 after Jim told her he thought Cathy was dead.
NEIGHBOR TO 911: Her husband’s here and he can’t even talk.
911 DISPATCHER: OK. I’ll have someone right over there …
Dispatch immediately sent first responders. Brighton Police Lieutenant Bill Flood arrived to get a statement from Krauseneck.
Det. Bill Flood: He was moaning, he was crying.
Annet Schlosser
Krauseneck, a Kodak company economist, said he’d left for work that morning at the usual time – around 6:30 a.m. He said he’d been gone all day. Cathy had planned to stay home to take care of Sara.
Det. Bill Flood: You could tell that little girl had been left alone … it looked obvious to us that she had dressed herself.
It seemed obvious to Detective Flood that Sara was confused about what had happened. Sara said she’d seen a “bad man … sleeping in mommy and daddy’s bed with an ax in his head.” Asked if the man was black or white, she said he was “many colors.” But Flood thinks Sara hadn’t seen a man at all; that it was her mother in bed, covered with blood.
Gary Craig: And what does a 3-and-a-half-year-old do?
Gary Craig reports for the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.
Gary Craig: The murder in and of itself is baffling and hard to believe … But you add this element where Cathy’s daughter has been left in the house … with her murdered mother … It’s inconceivable that somebody could do that.
Liberatore and his partner Steve Hunt of the Brighton Police Department, say the first investigators at the scene found no significant forensic clues like fibers or fingerprints. And in 1982, DNA had not yet become an investigative tool. But there was something about the scene that struck them immediately. It looked like someone had pushed the pause button on a burglary.
Det. Steve Hunt: And there was a door leading into the house that had a pane of glass broken out and there was a maul, which is like a heavier ax, on the ground leaning up against the wall right next to that.
Monroe County Court
The ax found at the door, and the one in Cathy’s head, both belonged to the Krausenecks. In the dining room, there were valuable items scattered.
Det. Steve Hunt: And on the floor was Cathy’s purse, with the contents … strewn about.
There was a tea set on the floor, too.
Det. Steve Hunt: Everything was standing straight up like it was set there neatly.
And a black garbage bag next to it. Inside, was a faint shoe print as if someone had stepped in it to hold it open. But despite many apparent signs of a burglary, Liberatore and Hunt say the most important one was missing.
Det. Steve Hunt: Nothing was taken.
Det. Mark Liberatore: There’s an officer involved in this case from the 1980’s … who hits the nail on the head: We in Brighton do not handle a lot of homicides. We do handle a lot of burglaries … And this was not a burglary.
Investigators suspected the burglary was simply staged to cover up the real crime — Cathy’s murder — and they began to focus on her husband.
Gary Craig: Let’s face it, I mean, more often than not … it’s the husband, it’s domestic … so police are going to go there.
But could Jim Krauseneck have committed such a brutal murder and left his baby daughter alone in that house? “48 Hours” spoke to friends and family who said the couple had seemed happy.
Cathy and Jim had grown up in the same small town in Michigan, but on opposite sides of the tracks. Cathy’s father was a trucker; Jim’s owned a successful carpet store. They met in high school, began dating in college, and married after graduation.
Annet Schlosser
Susie Jackimowicz: It was a fancy wedding.
Cathy’s cousin Susie was just a kid.
Susie Jackimowicz: Like a princess wedding kinda deal. Jim was pursuing an economics degree in Colorado when they had Sara in 1978.
Cathy Behe: She was just so excited about her daughter, just so excited about her.
Cathy Krauseneck’s friend, Cathy Behe, says she was a warm soul who lived for love, but remembers feeling that the last time they saw each other – just six months before the murder – something just didn’t seem right.
Cath Behe: Not the vivacious Cathy that I remembered.
Erin Moriarty: What was the next thing you heard?
Cathy Behe: I got a call from my sister, and she told me about Cathy being murdered.
If Cathy and Jim were having trouble, they kept it to themselves. But police grew suspicious when they discovered a pamphlet in the couple’s car that offered services including marriage counseling. And there was more. When they went to Kodak, they learned that Jim Krauseneck had gotten his job under false pretenses, claiming to have a Ph.D. when he’d never actually completed the program. There was also Krauseneck’s behavior. Newspaper reporter Gary Craig says initially, he was cooperative.
Gary Craig: He was willing early on to give statements.
Krauseneck had spoken to investigators that night and the next morning, even agreeing to another meeting that afternoon. But when the time came …
Gary Craig: He was gone.
Erin Moriarty: Less than 24 hours after he found his wife murdered?
Gary Craig: Yes.
Krauseneck’s parents had driven from Michigan and returned there with Jim and Sara. Police say Jim left town without telling them.
Det. Mark Liberatore: I wouldn’t consider it normal … but this is America and he’s free to do so.
When Rochester authorities followed them to Michigan, Krauseneck continued answering their questions and even provided hair and blood samples. Ten days after the murder, he hired a lawyer.
By this point, police were focused squarely on Jim Krauseneck. But they had a problem. They needed to establish exactly when the murder had happened. Had Jim even been home at the time? Remember, he told police he left for work at about 6:30 a.m.
Gary Craig: Back in 1982, the time of death gave a very broad range. And the science was that you really could not pinpoint.
Autopsy findings reportedly narrowed the time of death to between 4:30 a.m. and as late as 7:30 a.m. — an hour after Krauseneck claimed to have left the house. With no direct evidence against him, nor any clear motive, authorities didn’t want to try their luck with a jury. The investigation went cold.
Sharon Krauseneck
Krauseneck and Sara eventually moved out west. He would briefly wed twice more before marrying his current wife, Sharon, 23 years ago — Never dreaming that his past would come looking for him.
A SURPRISE VISIT
In 1997, Sharon James ran into Jim Krauseneck, an old friend, at a trade show when sparks flew.
Sharon Krauseneck: And he asked me out. And from then on, for two years, we dated.
They both lived near Seattle. Krauseneck and his daughter Sara had moved there 10 years earlier but couldn’t leave the past behind.
Sharon Krauseneck: He was devastated with the death of Cathy.
Sharon says Jim told her about Cathy’s 1982 murder but didn’t offer details.
Sharon Krauseneck: And I didn’t want to pry because he would start getting emotional.
Erin Moriarty: What was it that made you fall in love with him?
Sharon Krauseneck: Jim is … so honest. He’s so loving … I wanted to be a part of his family.
They married in 1999.
Sharon Krauseneck
Erin Moriarty: You like to spend a lot of time together?
Sharon Krauseneck: Oh, absolutely. … people will say we call each other everything but our names. We’ll call each other lovey-dovey, honey … and they say well, you act like newlyweds.
As the years rolled by, Sharon had no idea that more than 2,000 miles away in Rochester N.Y., someone else would set her sights on Jim Krauseneck: Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley.
DA Sandra Doorley: Cathy really needed to have justice.
In 2015, the FBI had provided resources to help Brighton police with their investigation.
Det. Steve Hunt: I mean you look at all those boxes of paperwork and evidence. … It’s daunting.
Detectives Mark Liberatore and Steve Hunt of the Brighton Police Department took the lead. Pouring over the file, they, too, became convinced the evidence pointed to one person: Jim Krauseneck. So, on April 16, 2016 …
Sharon Krauseneck: We were just having a lazy Saturday morning. And then all of the sudden, the doorbell rang.
DET. MARK LIBERATORE: Hi. … Mark Liberatore, how are you?
Erin Moriarty: You wanted to surprise him?
Det. Mark Liberatore: Yes.
Det. Steve Hunt: Absolutely.
DET. STEVE HUNT: You’re probably a little bit surprised why we’re here.
Erin Moriarty: Did Jim at that point think maybe I’d better call a lawyer?
Sharon Krauseneck: No, no not at all.
On the contrary. She says her husband welcomed them in and allowed them to record the conversation:
JIM KRAUSENECK: Hopefully you’ve got some good news.
DETECTIVE: We just want to kind of revamp everything, go through everything again with you.
She says they sat around the kitchen table talking for more than an hour.
Sharon Krauseneck (upbeat): They said … “we think we know who killed Cathy and we need your help.” And in that type of a tone.
DET. STEVE HUNT: I’m sure you think about this, “who could possibly have done this?”
JIM KRAUSENECK: I did, for a long time.
But then, Sharon says, detectives Liberatore and Hunt suddenly turned up the heat.
DET. MARK LIBERATORE: Did you have anything to do with this?
JIM KRAUSENECK: I didn’t kill Cathy.
DET. MARK LIBERATORE: I disagree.
JIM KRAUSENECK: Well then —
DET. MARK LIBERATORE: I think you did.
Det. Steve Hunt: You could see his heart pounding through his shirt.
Erin Moriarty: That would be a very scary thing … that somebody is accusing you of killing someone.
Det. Mark Liberatore: I would say scary … if you did it.
Erin Moriarty: Was that the first time then you started hearing details of what happened to Cathy?
Sharon Krauseneck: Yes
CBS News
Sharon says it also was the first time she’d heard any suggestion that her husband was involved.
Erin Moriarty: Did you ever ask him point-blank?
Sharon Krauseneck: No, I didn’t. I didn’t have to.
Erin Moriarty: You didn’t have to know?
Sharon Krauseneck: No … I know. I know he did not murder his wife.
Erin Moriarty: Sharon, how can you be so sure? You only have Jim’s word for it.
Sharon Krauseneck: No … When you’re married to a man, you know his heart and you know his soul. … Jim could never, Erin, never in this world do something so horrific.
Erin Moriarty: You know, somebody listening to you would say, you sound a little naive. Didn’t you have some doubts? Didn’t you want to know more?
Sharon Krauseneck: I — you can call me naive I suppose.
But she insists that no one who has known Jim Krauseneck as well as she has — for as long as she has — could possibly have doubts.
Sharon Krauseneck: No, I’m not going to question him. I don’t doubt for a moment he was innocent.
But the detectives still hoped to find what investigators 40 years ago were never able to find: a smoking gun that tied Jim Krauseneck to the Brighton ax murder.
DA Sandra Doorley: You have to remember, back in 1982, there was no such thing as DNA testing. So, my first thought was, y’know, what can we test? … Are we going to find someone else’s DNA on any item within the home?
Det. Mark Liberatore: We sent … the evidence from ’82 back to the FBI lab.
CBS News
The results: there was no DNA evidence that directly tied Krauseneck to the crime, but none tying anyone else to the murder, either. And although DNA evidence can degrade over time …
DA Sandra Doorley: The most important thing was finding the absence of someone else’s DNA within that home.
But to charge Jim Krauseneck, they wanted to prove his wife had died before had he gone to work. Jim claimed to have left the house at around 6:30 a.m., and Cathy had been fine.
Det. Mark Liberatore: We need a definitive time of death.
Back in 1982, the medical examiner was unable to narrow the time of death enough and, since then, other experts have agreed with her. In 2018, prosecutors turned to Dr. Michael Baden.
For over 50 years, Baden — a forensic pathologist — has been hired to work on a “who’s who” of whodunnit cases, from the assassination of JFK to the reported suicide of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, often raising eyebrows and generating controversy.
In this case, using the same file from 1982, Baden said in his analysis, it appeared Cathy died at about 3:30 a.m. That would be hours before Jim Krauseneck said he left for work that day.
DA Sandra Doorley: You know, some people may say that we were looking … for an opinion.
Erin Moriarty: That you were just looking for somebody who would pick a time of death that was before Krauseneck left the house in order to secure an indictment.
DA Sandra Doorley: Absolutely.
Erin Moriarty: But if, in fact, Dr. Baden had agreed with the other medical examiners … would you have hired him?
DA Sandra Doorley: Absolutely not.
Monroe County Sheriff’s Office
Armed with Dr. Baden’s opinion on Cathy’s time of death, along with what they believe is evidence of a staged burglary, prosecutors went before a grand jury. Jim Krauseneck was indicted on Nov. 1, 2019. He voluntarily surrendered to authorities a week later.
Erin Moriarty: Do you have any doubt about Jim Krauseneck’s guilt in his wife’s murder?
DA Sandra Doorley: I have absolutely no doubt.
Erin Moriarty: None?
DA Sandra Doorley: None, whatsoever.
But Jim Krauseneck’s attorneys say there’s a mountain of doubt in this case because Jim Krauseneck is not the Brighton ax murderer.
Bill Easton: There was someone who could be responsible for it.
A serial predator had been living in the neighborhood who actually confessed to killing Cathy.
ED LARABY: CAREER CRIMINAL
Attorneys Bill Easton and Michael Wolford are trying to save James Krauseneck.
Bill Easton: There really is no evidence that Jim Krauseneck killed his wife. … He is the most reserved, humble, gentle person.
A man both believe had zero motive for murder.
Michael Wolford: They had a wonderful relationship. They had a wonderful family.
And so, his lawyers insist that Feb. 19, 1982, was a typical morning, in a home defined by love, until a stranger slipped in and took it all away.
Bill Easton: Jim Krauseneck went to work … someone came in and killed Cathy Krauseneck. We think that someone was Ed Laraby.
Ed Laraby — a monster just down the road.
Gary Craig | Reporter: He was just a violent son of a gun and terrible, terrible human being.
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
From Rochester’s back streets to New York’s toughest prisons, Ed Laraby had a reputation and record as a violent sexual predator.
Michael Wolford: Laraby hunted women. … He was a psychopath.
Before dying in prison in 2014, Laraby was locked up for a total of 32 years on charges that ultimately included attempted murder, robbery and his sick specialty — rape. But all too often, Laraby was released back on the streets.
Rachel Rear: And every time he was free, he would rape again. … He liked to laugh at women and humiliate them.
Erin Moriarty: You probably know as much about Ed Laraby as anyone.
Rachel Rear: I think so.
Erin Moriarty: Right?
Rachel Rear: Yeah.
Rachel Rear wrote “Catch the Sparrow,” a harrowing story, painfully close to home.
Rachel Rear: It’s about the murder of my stepsister in 1991.
Stephanie Kupchynsky, 27, was a music teacher and violinist when her life tragically intersected with Ed Laraby’s.
Rachel Rear: It’s mind-boggling to me that he was ever free.
In 1991, freshly paroled after serving a sentence for robbery, Laraby had come back to the suburbs of Rochester … his familiar hunting ground.
Rachel Rear: He got the job at Newcastle apartment complex which is where my stepsister lived. … Laraby himself said that they were foolish to hire him.
It wasn’t long before Stephanie went missing.
Rachel Rear: It was like she evaporated.
LOCAL NEWS REPORT: Stephanie Kupchynsky’s death rattled many when she disappeared from her apartment in 1991. Her remains found 7 years later.
Rachel Rear
The remains of Stephanie Kupchynsky lay scattered in a shallow stream bed. She had been strangled.
More than a dozen years later, Laraby, by then convicted of other crimes and back in prison, admitted he was her killer.
Erin Moriarty: What made him confess to Stephanie’s murder?
Rachel Rear: What ultimately made him confess was that he was dying.
Laraby, who was suffering from ALS, came up with a bucket list of a dying man: pizza, sandwiches, and he was angling for an agreement to be buried off prison grounds. So, in 2012, Ed Laraby confessed.
Rachel Rear: He went into Stephanie’s apartment … And then she screamed … And then he choked her … And she died. And he confessed to killing her.
But Ed Laraby didn’t stop with Stephanie Kupchynsky.
Rachel Rear: Once he confessed to Stephanie’s murder and realized that he could get things in exchange for confession, all of a sudden then he started wheeling and dealing and making more deals.
Ed Laraby contacted the FBI claiming he was a serial killer, and one of the victims he listed was a Rochester housewife murdered on a February morning in 1982: 29-year-old Cathy Krauseneck.
Michael Wolford: Laraby lived very close by … And she was someone that he was going to prey on.
The idea that decades earlier Ed Laraby might have murdered Cathy doesn’t come as a surprise to investigators and those who know him best.
Det. Mark Liberatore: Everybody from back in that time frame is familiar with Ed.
Rachel Rear: He would’ve been out of prison at the time that Cathy was killed.
Free, violent and just down the road. Police went to question him, shortly after Cathy’s murder. But Ed Laraby wasn’t talking back then. They filed their report, and then backed off.
Erin Moriarty: And is it fair to say the police dropped the ball in that case? … Because you’ve got a sexual predator within minutes of the house and they … they don’t do anything more than visit him once?
Gary Craig: Oh, I think it’s very fair to say that. … To have apparently ignored Ed Laraby in 1982, whether he did or didn’t do it, is clearly — was just a major lapse in the investigation.
Det. Mark Liberatore: I don’t know that I’d used the phrase drop the ball … And unfortunately … the officer and the sergeant who approved that report are both deceased.
Still, the FBI and detectives Liberatore and Hunt don’t believe Ed Laraby murdered Cathy.
Det. Steve Hunt: He was a bad man, he was.
Erin Moriarty: That’s one way to put it.
Det. Mark Liberatore: He’s a bad man, but he’s not our bad man.
Erin Moriarty: This is a guy who has a long history of hurting women and he’s confessing to killing Cathy Krauseneck.
Det. Steve Hunt: Yeah, but his confession —
Det. Mark Liberatore: Inappropriately —
Det. Steve Hunt: — was way off base.
Det. Mark Liberatore: — way off.
Erin Moriarty: Why are you so sure it’s not Edward Laraby?
DA Sandra Doorley: Because his confession didn’t match up to the facts, as simple as that.
Annet Schlosser
Laraby said Cathy had dark hair when in fact she was blonde, that she was heavyset when she wasn’t. Even Rachel Rear, who knows all too well the damage Laraby can do, doesn’t believe he killed Cathy.
Rachel Rear: To me, I was like, it’s not his M.O. … I don’t think he was a serial killer. He’s a serial rapist.
After four decades of dead ends, law enforcement was convinced that Jim Krauseneck, not Ed Laraby, wielded that bloody ax.
Sharon Krauseneck: This man is an innocent man. … He’s been treated so unjust.
But come 2022, James Krauseneck, the successful businessman and father, headed to trial. The 40-year-old murder case could hinge on mere minutes, and prosecutors proving that Krauseneck was home when Cathy was killed.
PROSECUTOR PATRICK GALLAGHER (closing argument): You look at the evidence, it’s clear. She was killed in her sleep.
WHAT TIME DID CATHY DIE?
After four decades, as James Krauseneck finally came to trial, prosecutors were betting on Michael Baden, that forensic pathologist they had engaged, and his theory of when Cathy most likely died — about 3:30 a.m.
Michael Wolford: Well, they needed a Dr. Baden, who said basically that it happened at 3:30 in the morning. … That was different than any other medical examiner that was involved in this case.
One of them was Katherine Maloney, a forensic pathologist who would testify for the defense — something she had seldom done before.
Erin Moriarty: Can you pinpoint the actual time of death?
Dr. Katherine Maloney: No. Oh my goodness I wish I could … The best you’re going to do is — is a window of several hours.
Doctor Maloney thinks it’s possible Cathy could have died much later in the day.
Erin Moriarty: I mean, so you’re saying Dr Baden is wrong?
Dr. Katherine Maloney: I disagree with him. I think he’s wrong. … I think she likely died sometime between like 5 a.m. and 1 p.m.
Timing of the death seemed crucial. If Cathy was murdered in the dead of night, before Jim Krauseneck went to work, then prosecutors say her killer wasn’t an intruder — it had to be her husband.
Shawn Dowd/Pool
The stage was set for a gruesome drama in search of its final act.
NEWS REPORT: What makes this case so unique is it happened over 40 years ago.
Over those decades, hearts had been broken and relationships shattered.
Erin Moriarty: Really, how would you describe the last 40 years on your family?
Susie Jackimowicz: It’s been a terrible … It’s just god-awful.
CBS News
Cousin Susie Jackimowicz witnessed the shift in Cathy’s now 95-year-old father Bob Schlosser — who today believes Krauseneck is a killer, but for years was certain his son-in-law was innocent.
Bob Schlosser: I just didn’t think that he would — that he would do such a thing.
Erin Moriarty: I mean, had there ever been a real serious problem in their marriage that anybody had heard of?
Bob Schlosser: No, not that I knew of.
Annet Schlosser
But investigators believe the marriage was secretly crumbling.
Det. Mark Liberatore: He snapped is what we believe. He just snapped.
Erin Moriarty: People look at Jim Krauseneck, he just doesn’t look like an ax murderer.
Bob Schlosser: What’s an ax murderer look like?
Schlosser believes that over time, Krauseneck began separating Sara from her mother’s family — the child who was home when her mother was murdered.
Bob Schlosser: We didn’t see Sara anymore.
Susie Jackimowicz: Not only was Cathy taken away, Sara was taken away.
Shawn Dowd/Pool
Sara’s a grown woman now, firmly standing by her dad as sure that he’s innocent, as prosecutors Constance Patterson and Patrick Gallagher are certain he’s Cathy’s killer.
Prosecutor Patrick Gallagher: No doubt at all.
Prosecutor Constance Patterson: Absolutely no doubt in my mind.
But as the trial moved forward, lawyers on both sides confessed they had a daunting challenge: time itself.
Patrick Gallagher: Dealing with — with memory issues, dealing with deceased witnesses.
Bill Easton: Witnesses can’t recall what happened 40 years ago.
So, investigators pursued evidence that didn’t rely on the frailties of memory. They homed in on the physical crime scene.
Prosecutor Patrick Gallagher: I wanted to not only prove that that Cathy was clearly killed in the early morning hours, but also prove that it was a staged burglary.
Det. Steve Hunt: There’s a lot of questions and things just didn’t make sense.
Authorities argued the scene was staged by someone who had no idea what a burglary looked like.
Det. Steve Hunt: The house wasn’t ransacked.
Det. Mark Liberatore: In fact, there was cash on the dresser in the room where Cathy was killed, that wasn’t taken.
The broken glass, the seemingly precise placing of that maul.
Det. Steve Hunt: They wanted us to believe that the maul was used to break that pane of glass.
That silver tea set, barely disturbed.
Patrick Gallagher: And when you looked at the pieces that don’t fit, the reason they don’t fit is because it was a staged burglary.
Monroe County District Attorney
Then there was that faint shoeprint investigators found inside a garbage bag. Prosecutors thought the print told a story.
Patrick Gallagher: The only way that gets in there is when the bag is being opened, when items are being placed in that bag.
Erin Moriarty: And somebody is putting their foot on there, so they can hold it open?
Patrick Gallagher: So … You’re stepping on the edge of that bag … you’re holding one edge and you’re placing that silver in the bag.
Investigators say the print was from special footwear: a boat shoe.
Erin Moriarty: And why a boat shoe?
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Patrick Gallagher: And, so, there’s a picture in that bedroom where you can see next to the bed … You can see these boat shoes.
Erin Moriarty: And whose shoes are those?
Patrick Gallagher: And those are James Krauseneck’s shoes.
Det. Steve Hunt: He’s a boat shoe wearing guy, and we don’t have murderers running around in February in the wintertime wearing boat shoes and killing people.
But the shoes Krauseneck wore back then were not tested to see if they were a match. And his lawyers say it’s not just the wrong theory — it’s the wrong man.
They say it’s Ed Laraby, that career criminal, who, before he died, had confessed to killing Cathy.
Bill Easton: He lives four-minute walk away.
But there’s the problem of Laraby’s M.O. Remember, he was a repeat sex offender.
Erin Moriarty: Was there any sign that Cathy had been sexually assaulted or that she had had any contact at all with her killer?
Det. Mark Liberatore: None whatsoever.
Erin Moriarty: Do you believe that there was tunnel vision in this investigation?
Bill Easton: I think it would almost be the dictionary definition of tunnel vision … There was this overwhelming … urge and desire to solve the crime, and it had to be Jim Krauseneck.
Susie Jackimowicz: I know he did it. I know it was him.
Come closing statements, cameras were allowed into the courtroom as lawyers made their final pleas:
BILL EASTON: The mystery of Cathy Krauseneck’s death remains to this day, and we submit it has not been resolved by this trial.
PATRICK GALLAGHER: Common sense tells you this was a staged burglary. … Those are the only reasonable inferences that can be drawn from this case.
BILL EASTON: There are no eyewitnesses. There are no earwitnesses. … There is no direct evidence. That was the case 40 years ago and that’s the case now.
But Gallagher reminded the jury of that time-stamp — 3:30 a.m. — that pathologist Michael Baden put as Cathy’s possible time of death.
PATRICK GALLAGHER: Common sense tells you she died early that morning.
Michael Wolford: As we said at the outset, there is no new evidence, simply a new opinion by Dr. Baden. … We don’t think that cuts it.
Forty years after that awful day, the case would now go to a jury.
Erin Moriarty: Were you worried?
Sharon Krauseneck: I was worried, yes. … And Jim being the husband … and that’s being the typical fall guy, the husband must have done it. … I was very fearful.
A JURY DECIDES
Jim Krauseneck’s fate will be determined by 12 strangers.
Sharon Krauseneck: They want to hold someone accountable for this … I was very fearful.
Because it’s Sharon and Sara’s future as well.
Sharon Krauseneck: On Friday night. The jury hadn’t finished their deliberations. And I was so thankful. I thought, “Oh … give us this weekend (cries).
Erin Moriarty: Did you think this could be the last weekend you could spend with him?
Sharon Krauseneck: I think deep down, I probably did.
Jamie Germano
Altogether, it takes the jury less than 10 hours of deliberations to reach a verdict: Jim Krauseneck is guilty of second-degree murder.
Sharon Krauseneck: I remember standing up. I saw this one deputy across from me and I said, “Oh, please … let me hug my husband. … he said “no.” No … I can’t.
BOB SCHLOSSER (to reporters outside courtroom) We got our justice. It took 40 years. … Thank God, we got it.
SHARON KRAUSENECK (walking through court lobby with Sara): He’s innocent. He’s innocent!
Michael Wolford: Unfortunately, there is a presumption of guilt. … if the husband is … living in the home and the wife is killed … he’s almost presumed guilty,
Defense attorney Michael Wolford says that Jim Krauseneck was convicted because of who he was, not what he did.
Michael Wolford: I think there was a gut reaction on the part of the jurors, that “well, he probably did it.”
But the jurors “48 Hours” spoke to insisted they decided this case on the evidence — evidence they admit had divided them at the start.
Jane | Juror: I just kept thinking someone else really could have done this.
Helen | Juror: The forensics did not point to anybody else.
The first time they voted, we were told six said guilty, three not guilty, three undecided.
Ivan | Juror: The most important thing to me … was the staged burglary scene.
They said that staged scene was a critical clue. And there was something else they seemed to agree on. That, in the end, it was impossible to say exactly when Cathy died.
Jane: We threw out all of that testimony … We — It meant nothing to us.
But their verdict means everything to Krauseneck’s heartbroken daughter Sara, who tells the judge at sentencing it adds insult to deep injury.
SARA KRAUSENECK (in court): I’ve been blessed with the most extraordinary parents. Sadly, they have both been taken from my life. My mother’s killer got away with her murder, and my father’s life has been taken by a failed justice system that convicted him of a crime he did not commit.
But Sara’s grandfather — Cathy’s father — wants to make sure Jim Krauseneck spends the rest of his life paying for her death.
BOB SCHLOSSER (to Jim Krauseneck in court): And Jim, I hope you live to be 100 years old and enjoy your new home!
And finally, it’s up to Jim Krauseneck himself to take one last opportunity to address the court.
JIM KRAUSENECK (in court): To this day it’s still very difficult for me to talk about the circumstances that surrounded her death. All I see is Cathy with an ax in her head, and Sara standing in the hallway, disheveled, with an empty and distant look on her face. I did not murder Cathy. I loved Cathy with all my heart and with all my soul.
The judge is unmoved, giving the 71-year-old Krauseneck 25 years-to-life behind bars.
Before his own life is over, there’s one more thing Cathy’s father wants to do.
For decades, Cathy has been buried in Jim’s family plot.
Bob Schlosser: I want to move my daughter’s remains … where her mother and brother are.
But to move her, Bob Schlosser needs Sara to agree and that may never happen. Sara and Sharon continue to support Jim, who intends to appeal his conviction.
Erin Moriarty: You’re going to stand by him no matter what?
Sharon Krauseneck: Oh, absolutely.
Sharon Krauseneck rejects the possibility that her husband has permanently traded his golden years for the hardened metal of a prison cell.
Sharon Krauseneck: We have a lot of hope. We have a lot of faith. … This is not our retirement. This is a hiccup. This is just a — just a — a pause.
And Krauseneck’s lawyers say that forcing him to defend a 40-year-old case violated his constitutional right to a fair trial.
Erin Moriarty: Are you worried at all about that … if an appellate court ruled in favor … of Jim Krauseneck, and said that his rights had been violated … then it would all be for nothing?
DA Sandra Doorley: It wouldn’t be all for nothing. Cathy’s story was able to be told and that family was able to get justice … Justice has been done for Cathy.
Cathy’s family and Sara haven’t spoken since the trial.
Sara has moved out of the country.
Produced by Josh Yager and James Stolz. Marc Goldbaum and Charlotte Fuller are the development producers. Michael Loftus and Liz Caholo are the associate producers. Richard Barber is the producer-editor. Atticus Brady is also an editor. Patti Aronofsky is the senior producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer.
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The Brighton ax murder: A timeline of the 40-year-old cold case
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In the winter of 1982 in Rochester, New York, Jim Krauseneck says he came home from work to find his wife, Cathleen Krauseneck, lying in bed, dead with an ax lodged in her head. For over 30 years, no one was charged with Cathy’s murder, until the Brighton Police Department collaborated with the FBI to reopen the case in 2015 with their sights set on Krauseneck as the primary suspect.
CBS News
The unsolved murder of Cathy Krauseneck ended with the conviction of her husband in 2022. But Jim Krauseneck and his supporters argue the jury got it wrong.
1966-1974: The early years
USA Today/IMAGN
Jim and Cathy Krauseneck grew up in the small town of Mount Clemens, Michigan. Jim’s family owned a carpet store; Cathy’s father was a truck driver. They met each other in high school and started dating while attending Western Michigan University.
May 3, 1974: Jim Krauseneck and Cathy Schlosser wed
Annet Schlosser
Soon after marrying, the young couple moved to Fort Collins, Colorado, where Jim attended graduate school at Colorado State University. Cathy worked as an orthopedic therapist.
April 1978: Cathy gave birth to a baby girl, Sara
1979 to 1981: Jim taught at Lynchburg College
The Krauseneck’s moved to Lynchburg, Virginia, where Jim taught economics at Lynchburg College.
September 1981: New job, new city
Annet Schlosser
Jim, Cathy and then 3-year-old Sara moved to Brighton, an upscale suburb of Rochester, New York. Jim started a new job as an economist for Kodak.
Feb. 16, 1982: Background check
CBS News
Kodak reportedly discovered Jim Krauseneck did not complete his Ph.D. from Colorado State University.
Feb. 19, 1982 | Around 6:30 a.m.: Jim Krauseneck told investigators he left for work
Feb. 19, 1982 | 4:50 p.m.: Jim Krauseneck returns home
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Jim Krauseneck told investigators he returned home after work. He said he found the garage door open and saw broken glass on the floor by the front door along with a maul.
Jim said he then ran upstairs to the master bedroom where he found Cathy in bed with an ax embedded in her head. Sara was unharmed in the next bedroom.
Feb. 19, 1982 | Around 5 p.m.: Jim Krauseneck runs to his neighbor’s home
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Jim Krauseneck’s neighbor told investigators Krauseneck came to her door “clutching Sara in his arms” with the “look of terror on his face.” The neighbor called 911, frantically telling the operator she believes a murder occurred across the street.
Feb. 19, 1982 | Around 5:03 p.m.: Authorities start arriving at the scene
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Although police were unable to find significant forensic clues like fingerprints, they did find what they say was evidence of a staged burglary. There were valuable items scattered across the dining room floor, including Cathy’s purse and a tea set.
Investigators say nothing was taken and both the ax and the maul belonged to the Krausenecks.
Believing a burglary could have been staged to cover up Cathy’s murder, investigators began to focus on Jim Krauseneck.
Feb. 19, 1982: The crime scene
Monroe County District Attorney
Detectives discovered a faint shoe print inside a trash bag near the silver tea set.
Feb. 19, 1982 | Later in the evening: Brighton Police Det. Bill Flood interviews Sara Krauseneck
Annet Schlosser/Bill Flood
Sara, 3-and-a-half years old, mentioned seeing a “bad man,” but she first said the man had a hammer in his head. Then she said an ax. She also described the man’s face as “many colors.” Detective Flood believed Sara was not seeing a “man” at all… but rather her dead mother, covered in blood.
Feb. 20, 1982: Cathy’s autopsy is conducted and Jim heads to Michigan
USA Today/Imagn
Jim Krauseneck spoke to investigators again and agreed to another meeting with investigators in the afternoon. But when the time came, Jim and Sara had left to be with family in Michigan.
Meanwhile, the medical examiner concluded Cathy Krauseneck’s cause of death was from the ax wound to the head.
During the autopsy, the medical examiner reportedly found no evidence of sexual assault and narrowed Cathy’s time of death somewhere between 4:30 a.m and 7:30 a.m. Authorities could not prove Jim Krauseneck had been home at the time she died.
With no direct evidence against Jim Krauseneck nor any clear motive, the case went cold for decades.
Jim and Sara Krauseneck moved out west. He would briefly wed twice more before marrying his current wife Sharon.
1997: Jim Krauseneck meets his current wife, Sharon
Sharon Krauseneck
While at a trade show, Krauseneck runs into Sharon James, an old friend. The two date for the next two years and marry in 1999.
2014: A Rochester career criminal “confesses” to Cathy’s murder
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Before dying from ALS, Edward Laraby, a career criminal who had been locked up on charges of attempted murder, robbery and sexual abuse, wrote a confession claiming he killed Cathy Krauseneck. Authorities said Laraby’s confession was riddled with errors that didn’t match up to the facts of the case. Laraby mischaracterized Cathy as a brunette and heavy set. He said he sexually assaulted her and then killed her. But investigators at the scene found no evidence of sexual abuse. Due to these inconsistencies, prosecutors and authorities do not take action.
2015: The case is reopened and the FBI gets involved
In April 2015, at the direction of former Brighton Police Chief Mark Henderson, a thorough review of the case, including travel to interview potential witnesses, persons with knowledge and suspects, was to be conducted.
In June 2015, then-Police Chief Henderson and then-Captain Catholdi attended a meeting of the FBI Buffalo Cold Case Group and presented the Krauseneck case to the group. After a Q & A period in which several ideas on how to proceed were discussed, the entire case file was given to the FBI to be digitized.
Chief Henderson contacted Cathy Krauseneck’s family to let them know the new status of the case.
April 2016: Investigators interview Jim Krauseneck again
Sharon Krauseneck
Brighton, N.Y., investigators Mark Liberatore and Steven Hunt pay Jim Krauseneck a surprise visit at his home in Gig Harbor, Washington, for an interview. During the interview, Det. Liberatore asks Krauseneck outright if he had something to do with his wife’s death. After Krauseneck told him he didn’t kill Cathy, Liberatore said he disagreed and thinks he did do it.
2018: Authorities contact pathologist Dr. Michael Baden
AP Newsroom
Seeking another opinion on when Cathy Krauseneck could have been killed, the Brighton Police Department and the Monroe County District Attorney’s office asked pathologist and former New York Chief Medical Examiner Michael Baden to review the evidence.
October 2019: Dr. Baden reports his findings
CBS News
After reviewing the Monroe County autopsy, toxicology reports, the scene, autopsy photographs and police reports, Dr. Baden stated that it appeared that Cathy died around 3:30 a.m. Prosecutors believe that means Jim Krauseneck would have been home during the time Cathy was killed.
November 2019: Jim Krauseneck indicted and arrested
Monroe County Sheriff’s Office
The grand jury indictment was signed on Nov. 1 and a week later Krauseneck surrendered to authorities at the Hall of Justice in Rochester, NY. The then-67-year-old pleaded not guilty.
Sept. 6, 2022: The trial begins
Shawn Dowd/Pool
Forty years after Cathy Krauseneck was killed in her sleep, her husband Jim Krauseneck stands trial for her murder. Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley insists she has “absolutely no doubt that Jim Krauseneck killed Cathy that day.” Defense attorney Bill Easton says his client is innocent and told “48 Hours,” “There really is no evidence that Jim Krauseneck killed his wife.”
September 2022: Expert shoe witness called to the stand
Monroe County District Attorney’s Office
Prosecutors called an expert witness who testified the footprint found inside the trash bag was from a special footwear – a boat shoe. A pair was captured in one of the 1982 crime scene photographs of the bedroom. But the shoes Krauseneck wore back then were not tested to see if they were a match. Jim Krauseneck’s lawyers say investigators have the wrong theory and the wrong man.
Sept. 22, 2022: Closing arguments
Shawn Dowd/Pool
The morning after closing arguments are heard, the court hands the case to the jury, who will determine whether Jim Krauseneck is guilty or not guilty of Cathy’s murder. The jurors’ decision will also affect the futures of his wife Sharon and his daughter Sara, who was 3-and-a-half years old when her mother was killed. Sara, now 44, attended the trial to support her father.
Sept. 26, 2022: A verdict
Jamie Germano
A jury finds Jim Krauseneck guilty of second-degree murder of his first wife Cathy. Deputies immediately take him into custody.
Nov. 7, 2022: Jim Krauseneck sentenced
Shawn Dowd/Pool
During sentencing, Sara, the girl left in the house at the time of her mother’s murder, read a statement in which she expressed her disappointment in the verdict.
“My mother’s killer got away with her murder, and my father’s life has been taken by a failed justice system that convicted him of a crime he did not commit,” she said.
In his statement before sentencing, Jim Krauseneck, 71, spoke to the court for the first time. Krauseneck read a note in which he reaffirmed his love for Cathy and his innocence.
“In closing, I did not murder Cathy. I love Cathy. With all my heart and with all my soul,” he said.
The judge sentenced Krauseneck to 25 years in prison.
November 2022: Jim Krauseneck plans to appeal
While Krauseneck was found guilty by a jury, his supporters, including his daughter Sara, his wife Sharon, and his immediate family are still sure of his innocence and convinced that he was convicted of a crime he did not commit.
In her statement at court, Sharon Krauseneck said they plan to appeal the jury’s guilty verdict “so that justice can truly and honestly be served.”
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The Kidnapping of Michelle and Breea Renee
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The Kidnapping of Michelle and Breea Renee – CBS News
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The Station Nightclub Fire: Who’s Responsible?
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The Station Nightclub Fire: Who’s Responsible? – CBS News
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Calif. mother who was kidnapped and forced to rob a bank falsely painted as a criminal in court:
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The only monsters that had ever scared Michelle Renee’s 7-year-old daughter Breea were make-believe. But on Nov. 20, 2000, just a day before three masked men broke in …
Michelle Renee: She calls me. ‘Mom, there’s somebody outside the window’ … I looked out there. I didn’t see anything. I didn’t see anybody. … So, I just brushed it off.
Michelle Renee
Michelle had chalked it up to her child’s imagination. But this time was different.
Michelle Renee: She saw them looking through the window. They were there the night before.
The same men now held Michelle and Breea at gunpoint in the living room. The gunmen said they’d been following the 35-year-old bank manager for months.
Michelle Renee: It was very much that mind control thing that they were doing, that “we know everything about you.”
Michelle would recount the events inside the house for investigators:
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: “We’re going to be here all night with you to make sure you know exactly what you’re going to do or you will die.”
Throughout the night, the ringleader gave specific instructions about how he wanted Michelle to rob her own bank the next morning:
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: “We’re going to go over this again. This is what you’re going to do … When Brinks gets there, you’re going to get Brinks’ money.”
As she huddled with Breea on the couch, now duct taped, Michelle could hear him talking to a woman on a two-way radio.
Michelle Renee: Money One to Money Two were their –
Tracy Smith: That’s what they called each other.
Michelle Renee: Yeah, they called each other Money One to Money Two.
Money One was the ringleader. Around 11, the voice on the walkie-talkie got his attention: “Car coming up the driveway. The roommate’s there.”
It was their roommate Kimbra.
North County Superior Court
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: And they put the gun right here in her face, right up her nose, and said, “don’t make us f***ing use this.” … I pushed the guy’s hand out of her face and said, “don’t do this, don’t hurt her.” And he just pointed it right at me and said, “don’t ever f***ing touch me again …”
Michelle realized this might be the last night she ever spent with her daughter.
MICHELLE RENEE VIDEO WALKTHROUGH: It was almost morning. … I just rubbed her hair so she could try to get some sleep.
Michelle Renee: Wondering if that was gonna be the last time I was gonna get to touch her hair and see her sleep … was pretty tough.
In the morning the nightmare would continue.
Michelle Renee: It was like 6 a.m. … he said “Get up. It’s time to get ready for work.”
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: I got dressed and started doing my hair when he came in and stopped me and said, “we need to put the dynamite on you now.”
North County Superior Court
Michelle, her roommate Kimbra, and Breea would all be strapped with dynamite. Then Money One showed Michelle what looked like a doorbell.
Michelle Renee: “This is a detonation device. … you will disintegrate. Your daughter will go first.”
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE:: “One false move, I push this button.” …
And they sat me right here and said, “now we’re going to take your daughter.”
The gunmen put Breea in her bedroom closet.
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: I was just telling her I’d be right back, that everything is going to be fine.
Michelle Renee: “Be brave, Mommy” … that was the last thing she said … before I walked out to go to the bank.
Tracy Smith: Did you feel brave?
Michelle Renee: No.
As two of the gunmen stayed in the house, Money One handed Michelle a briefcase stuffed with a duffle bag before he crouched in the back of her Jeep. With dynamite on her back and a gun to her side, she drove to work.
Tracy Smith (outside of the bank): So, you pull up into your spot … What does he tell you before you get out of the car?
Michelle Renee: “Don’t … don’t f*** this up.”
Tracy Smith: The Brinks truck came at — 8:50?
Michelle Renee: I believe right around 8:50 was the drop, right over here (poins to the left side of the building from the entrance).
That’s when Michelle grabbed her briefcase and headed to the vault.
Michelle Renee: I brought my teller in the vault with me, said … “I’m getting ready to clear out this vault, or my daughter and I are gonna die. This is what’s happened all night.”
Tracy Smith: And you whispered to her “I have dynamite on my back”?
Michelle Renee: Yes. …Yeah, I whisp — I pulled my shirt up.
Tracy Smith: And then you just opened up the duffel bag and started shoveling in money?
Michelle Renee: I did. … My heart was racing. My –”am I fast enough?”
Michelle’s colleagues would alert the authorities, but not before she walked out with $360,000.
Michelle Renee: … Just get to the Jeep. Hurl it in the Jeep —
Tracy Smith: And go.
Michelle Renee: — and just do what’s next.
Money One directed Michelle to get out a few blocks later.
Michelle Renee: And that I would find my Jeep down the street.
She found her car and raced home.
Michelle Renee: I don’t know if Breea’s gonna be there. I don’t know if she’s gonna be alive when I get there … And I went to open the door, and I was just screaming … “Hello? Hello?” … It was eerily silent.
Breea Renee: And I just heard “Breea,” and I remember screaming, “We’re back here, we’re back here.”
Breea was still in the closet right where Michelle had left her.
Tracy Smith: What was that like to hear and see her?
Michelle Renee: Oh my gosh … She was alive. … “I did it. We did it. … we didn’t die.”
Breea Renee: Probably the happiest moment of my life. … But then I could still see the panic on her face.
Michelle Renee: The dynamite’s still on me.
Before leaving, the gunmen had ripped the dynamite off of Kimbra and Breea. So, they cut it off of Michelle’s back before running to the nearest neighbor.
Rick Brown lived up a steep hill.
Rick Brown | Neighbor: I opened the gate, went down the hill real fast, helped them up to the house. I called 911 right away.
911 DISPATCHER: Sheriff’s Department, can I help you?
RICK BROWN: Yes, some neighbors of ours were held hostage … I need somebody out here right away.
Soon, the place was crawling with investigators from the FBI, San Diego Sheriff’s Department, and the bomb squad.
Tom Manning: This is the dynamite that was taken off of Michelle.
San Diego County Prosecutor Tom Manning would lead the task force investigating the case. They quickly figured out the dynamite was fake.
Tom Manning: They realize that it actually is two painted dowels or broomstick handles … But as you can see from a distance and the lighting, plus it’s on your back with the stress of the situation, you’re not gonna take a chance that it isn’t real.
But during the very real 14 hours they were held hostage, Michelle had held onto any detail that might help identify the attackers.
Michelle Renee: Remembering details is just sort of this part of my DNA about people. That was kinda my superpower.
Details like Money One’s eyes.
CBS News/Michelle Renee
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: When I turned the light on to go to the bathroom … and I saw his eyes in there… I said “those eyes were at my desk; those eyes were at my desk today. Oh my God.”
Michelle says it was a man with whom she’d had an odd encounter at the bank hours before being taken hostage.
Michelle Renee: And he sat at my desk for a really long time asking sorta the same questions over and over. … and then a woman walked in and said, “Chris, we need to get going.” And they got up and left.
The man had handed Michelle his business card.
Tracy Smith: And the name on the business card was?
Michelle Renee: Christopher Butler.
THE EVIDENCE LEFT BEHIND
After hours of police questioning, Michelle and Breea were sent to a hotel. Michelle called her brother Dave.
Dave Estey: It didn’t sound like her … it was — someone, you know, heavily traumatized.
Dave, who lived three hours away, rushed to his sister’s aid.
Dave Estey: What I saw when I opened that door … it scared the daylights out of me. … “Are you OK?” And she would shake.
Tracy Smith: How about Breea?
Dave Estey: Same thing.
In the days ahead, Michelle struggled to hold it together for her daughter – “She was the strongest person for me,” says Breea — while investigators wanted answers.
They grilled her about that odd encounter with Christopher Butler.
Tracy Smith: Why was he in the bank? What was he saying he was there for?
Michelle Renee: He came in to say that he was a potential client. And that he wanted to talk about investments.
Before Butler handed Michelle his business card, a woman he introduced as Lisa came in and whisked him away.
Michelle Renee: “Hey, Chris, we need to go.”
It was the same voice Michelle says she heard later that night on the walkie-talkie.
Michelle Renee: I kept saying it over and over.
Tracy Smith: “Check my desk. Get that card.”
Michelle Renee: “Check my desk. Get that card. …I know that it’s them.”
Tom Manning: Through that card, they started the investigation.
North County Superior Court
The FBI soon discovered Butler was a convicted felon with a history of robbing banks.
Tom Manning: They figured out where he was staying … then the team that I work with set up surveillance.
Butler and his fiancée, Lisa Ramirez, lived in a house just a few miles from the bank.
Tom Manning: Some of the people in the house were tellin’ the police who was there, when they planned it
Within days, detectives identified the two other men. Christopher Huggins –
Tom Manning: He was a big guy, maybe — maybe 6’4″ he’s … gang ties.
And the man who’d held a gun to little Breea — a gang member called “Bones” — real name Robert Ortiz.
Tom Manning: Ortiz was the connection … who got the guns.
On Dec. 1, they decided to arrest Butler and Ramirez during a traffic stop.
North County Superior Court
Tom Manning (in evidence room): In the glove compartment was a weapon … it’s actually a BB gun … if you look at that in a stressful situation, that looks as real as it can get.
Tracy Smith: What’d they find when they popped the trunk?
Tom Manning: A plethora of evidence.
Tracy Smith: All this.
Tom Manning: All this. … They found the black bag that Michelle described the money being carried in, several pairs of black gloves … and a homemade ski mask.
Tracy Smith: Oh, yeah. Look at the eyeholes there that they clearly cut themselves.
Tom Manning: Michelle’s credit cards were all found in the trunk of the vehicle … and then of course the money straps from the bank.
Also in the trunk, that doorbell “detonator”. And there was even more at the house.
Tom Manning: They found all the ingredients to make the fake bomb. … There were broom handles, which were cut up into small dowels which actually were used in making the fake dynamite. … They also recovered the actual spray cans … Ramirez’s fingerprint was on one of those cans.
Tom Manning: It was crazy. I’ve never seen that much physical evidence left at a crime scene.
Tracy Smith: They thought they’d gotten away with it.
Tom Manning: Yeah.
One thing investigators didn’t find on Butler and Ramirez – any of the bank’s $360,000. But after arresting Huggins that same day, they did recover $93,000 of the cash that he’d stashed away. Huggins confessed and said he’d already spent several grand on a trip to Vegas. The fourth suspect, Robert Ortiz, was on the lam.
When authorities arrested him three months later in Wisconsin, Ortiz still had $32,000 of the bank’s money and gave a full confession.
Tracy Smith: Did Huggins and Ortiz’s confessions corroborate each other?
Tom Manning: Yes, very much so.
Tracy Smith: So, did Huggins and Ortiz’s confessions corroborate what Michelle had told investigators?
Tom Manning: Yes, almost identical.
North County Superior Court
Butler denied everything, even when confronted with direct evidence: his thumbprint on the fake dynamite sticks.
DETECTIVE: We’ve got fingerprints that are yours that link you to the bank robbery.
CHRISTOPHER BUTLER: I doubt that because I wasn’t involved in the bank robbery.
He tried to protect Ramirez.
CHRISTOPHER BUTLER: Lisa wouldn’t have been involved with that.
But Ramirez was about to start talking. She admitted she was the female voice on the walkie-talkie.
LISA RAMIREZ: That was me.
DETECTIVE: That was you?
LISA RAMIREZ: Mm-hmm.
North County Superior Court
She even took credit for the idea to use fake dynamite and kidnap the bank manager.
LISA RAMIREZ: I honestly know whose idea it was, about eight months ago.
DETECTIVE: Who?
LISA RAMIREZ: Jokingly, mine.
Ramirez said they’d split the money three ways, but that her and Butler’s share – more than $100,000 – had been stolen. And to everyone’s surprise, she said Michelle was in on the plot.
LISA RAMIREZ: Supposedly from what they had told me this Michelle lady was helping them.
Tom Manning: We walked out of that thinking, “OK, Lisa’s the mastermind behind all this. And, is it possible Michelle’s involved?”
Manning says, ultimately, he knew Michelle was innocent.
Tom Manning: The first time I interviewed her, she had Breea with her. And … I saw that bond and relationship. And when she left, I went, “She’s not involved in this.”
But that wouldn’t be enough in court. San Diego County Sheriff’s detectives Rudy Zamora, Dale Martin and Randi Demers would have to rule Michelle out as a suspect.
Rudy Zamora: Every time we pushed a button, she would react in a way … a true victim should.
They recreated the dynamite packs and strapped them on Kimbra, Michelle and Breea.
Dale Martin: She was very upset.
And Michelle was emotional when asked to revisit the horrific details of the kidnapping.
FBI VIDEO OF MICHELLE RENEE AT CRIME SCENE: And then they — I had to put her in there and they just shut the — shut the closet.
Dale Martin: She was shaken up. I thought she was gonna have a nervous breakdown.
Tracy Smith: When Michelle did those reenactments, were her story, Kimbra’s story, and Breea’s story consistent?
Tom Manning: Yes. Completely consistent.
In fact, investigators couldn’t find any evidence Michelle was involved. Still, they worried as they took a deep dive into Michelle’s life.
Rudy Zamora: She was not our normal victim.
Tracy Smith: What did they find out about Michelle’s past?
Tom Manning: She didn’t hide anything.
Including the fact that for years she had worked as a stripper.
Michelle Renee: I’m not embarrassed or ashamed by any of that.
Michelle says it was one of the choices she had to make for survival at a young age.
Michelle Renee: I ran away at 15. … I worked really, really hard to get to where I was.
Michelle Renee
With no high school diploma, she had climbed the corporate ladder all the way to regional vice president before taking the bank manager job to be home more with Breea.
Tracy Smith: And while you were working at the bank, you were still dancing, still stripping for a while?
Michelle Renee: I was for a while …The money was really great.
But more worrisome were things that went directly to Michelle’s credibility.
Tom Manning: She falsified resumés … claimed she had various experience, various education which she didn’t have.
Tracy Smith: Bounced a check, filed for bankruptcy.
Tom Manning: Right.
Tracy Smith: That doesn’t look good.
Tom Manning: It doesn’t look good. …And if you’re a defense attorney, you’re lickin’ your chops.
ATTACKED AT TRIAL
By spring of 2001, the suspects were in custody awaiting trial for kidnapping and bank robbery charges, but Michelle and Breea were still reeling from that night of terror.
Michelle Renee: I could still hear them. I could still hear the sounds … I couldn’t get it to turn off.
Breea Renee: I just wanted to hide. I thought they were gonna find us. They were gonna kill us still.
In June, Michelle decided to move Breea to Alaska to live with her grandmother.
Michelle Renee: I was gonna fly her up there and get her to safety … I was gonna figure out what to do from there.
After a few days, Michelle says she had an epiphany.
Michelle Renee: To go back to San Diego and get rid of everything I could possibly get rid of and drive back to Alaska.
With a dog, some cash, and a camcorder, in July she embarked on a 9-day drive to the Last Frontier.
Tracy Smith: You had a deadline.
Michelle Renee: I had a deadline. Breea’s birthday was in nine days. And I’d promised her I’d be back before her birthday party.
Michelle Renee
That’s when Michelle and Breea say they began to heal.
Tracy Smith: Did you feel safe in Alaska?
Breea Renee: Safer … I could be a kid again.
By the time they returned to San Diego a year later for the trial, Michelle says she was ready.
Michelle Renee: There was so much evidence. There was no way I thought that this trial was gonna be anything but … slam dunk.
Butler and Ramirez would be tried first.
Tracy Smith: When her case came across your desk what did you think at first?
Herb Weston: She’s guilty.
Tracy Smith: You thought she’s guilty?
Herb Weston: Well, yeah.
Herb Weston, who represented Lisa Ramirez, had a problem. His client had confessed on camera.
DETECTIVE: There was a female voice that came out on one of those walkie-talkies.
LISA RAMIREZ: That was me.
Herb Weston: If they play that tape, saying that she wasn’t involved woulda been difficult.
Weston proposed a plea deal, hoping to save Ramirez from a potential life sentence. But the prosecution turned him down.
Tom Manning: We thought we would definitely get the key statements in that she was involved.
But, since Ramirez had also implicated Butler, the judge ruled her entire statement inadmissible.
Herb Weston: We now can at least argue to the jury that she wasn’t involved.
Without her confession, the case against Ramirez relied almost entirely on Michelle — a fact Manning was keenly aware of during his opening statement to the jury on June 3, 2002.
Tracy Smith: You told the jury that this case was about credibility.
Tom Manning: Right … Michelle’s background was gonna be an issue … I knew there were issues … but I believed her.
Tracy Smith: And you thought … the jury would believe her.
Tom Manning: Right.
But not if the defense had its way.
Tracy Smith: What was your strategy going into trial?
Herb Weston: My strategy was to beat the hell out of the victim and show all these inconsistencies that the victim is saying.
Tom Manning: It got very confrontational.
Michelle Renee: I was really, really pissed off.
That played right into Weston’s hand.
Herb Weston: Angry witnesses don’t come across as credible.
Michelle Renee: I was treated like I was the criminal.
During his cross-examination, Weston implied Michelle was lying about recognizing Lisa Ramirez’ voice on the walkie-talkie.
Herb Weston: Well, wait a minute, ma’am. I’ve looked at all this stuff. … isn’t this the first time you’ve said that?
In fact, he pointed out it wasn’t in any of the FBI reports. But Michelle insists she told them.
Michelle Renee: I did … I 100% did.
And Manning says she identified Ramirez’s voice to him before taking the stand.
Tracy Smith: Does it bother you that Lisa actually admitted that that was her voice on the walkie-talkie? … the fact is it was Lisa.
Herb Weston: But that’s not the issue. … for me it made a great opening to attack her credibility.
Weston then grilled Michelle about bait money — the traceable bills banks keep in their vaults to trap bank robbers.
Tracy Smith: You didn’t take the bait money.
Michelle Renee: Did not take the bait money.
Tracy Smith: Why not?
Michelle Renee: They said … “no funny money.”
Tracy Smith: You say that’s suspicious, that she must have been in on it.
Herb Weston: Correct.
ZUMA
Maybe worst of all for Michelle, Weston questioned her maternal instincts.
Herb Weston: Would a mother run … to a place where her daughter was … if she believes that “I have a bomb on my back?”
Tracy Smith: She wasn’t sure whether her daughter was dead or alive. Don’t you think it’s possible she wasn’t thinking straight?
Herb Weston: Sure … But also what could be true is she knew there wasn’t a bomb, and so she didn’t have to worry about it.
Tracy Smith: Did you feel like you were on trial?
Michelle Renee: 100% felt like I was on trial.
Dave Estey: I would be sitting in the front row. And all I could think about was … it’s gonna take me … maybe six seconds to get from this point to the offender. … that is how irate I was.
Tracy Smith: Day after day, listening to this.
Dave Estey: Listening to this.
Tracy Smith: Is it fair to beat up the victim.
Herb Weston: Oh absolutely, absolutely.
While Weston hammered on every decision Michelle made that day, the attorney representing Butler went after everything else.
Tracy Smith: What was the worst thing they asked you?
Michelle Renee: About my sex life. … They were trying to paint me as somebody that was irresponsible … A selfish, terrible mother … that … would do anything for money.
And they picked apart Michelle’s finances.
Tom Manning: She’s in … financial distress, and that could be the motive.
Tracy Smith: Isn’t it kinda odd that we’re talking about motive when we’re talking about a victim?
Tom Manning: It is. … The defense in the case was to make Michelle a culprit here.
After Michelle’s grueling three-day testimony, it was Christopher Butler’s turn. He protected Lisa Ramirez on the stand, claiming Michelle was the mastermind, and that they’d had an affair.
Tom Manning: I was shocked.
Michelle Renee: It’s almost laughable.
Tracy Smith: What was his story about how the two of you met?
Michelle Renee: From what I understand … we met in a grocery store and that I recruited him.
Zuma
Butler claimed that he’d gone to Michelle’s house that night with Huggins and Ortiz. He said that in the early morning hours while smoking pot, Michelle brought up the bank robbery idea again and decided they should do it that morning.
Tracy Smith: His evidence of this, his proof of this?
Tom Manning: Zero … If any of this were true, he woulda thrown Michelle down in a heartbeat in his (police) interview.
The jury deliberated for five days before finding Butler guilty of the bank robbery and Breea and Kimbra’s kidnapping. But they hung 9-3 on the charges of kidnapping Michelle.
Tom Manning: When we talked to the jurors, you know, we discovered … it was one juror who completely believed Butler and the other two jurors … were unsure.
And they found Lisa Ramirez not guilty on all counts.
Herb Weston: Oh, it was the best verdict I ever got in my life.
Michelle Renee: Mind-boggling. The fact it was her idea to do this to a mother and a child and laughing and proud of it.
Tracy Smith: How involved do you think she was in this?
Tom Manning: Very involved … the investigators kept saying … she was the brains of the outfit.
Tracy Smith: So, the brains of the outfit walked.
Tom Manning: Right.
The second trial would go very differently, with Huggins and Ortiz easily convicted.
Tracy Smith: In so many of the stories that we tell, the ending is the conviction. But in your case, in a lot of ways, that’s just the beginning.
FACING NEW CHALLENGES
Even though the men who had terrorized them were now serving multiple life sentences, Michelle and Breea would never be the same.
Breea Renee: There’s aspects of that night that are gonna be with me for the rest of my life.
They were treated for post-traumatic stress disorder for over two years. Michelle says dealing with the break-in led to a breakthrough.
Michelle Renee: It was two choices. … call them monsters and stay angry … and blame everything in my life on them … Or … I can take this other road.
Michelle Renee: The best thing I could do for Breea is to be an example.
Michelle wrote a book, “Held Hostage,” which was made into a TV movie. And she and Breea went on speaking tours to discuss their experience with trauma.
Tracy Smith: A lot of people coming out of this would want to just forget about it, put it behind them. But you and your mom … talked openly about it.
Breea Renee: Yes. And I think it was the best decision for us.
CBS News
Breea Renee: I was showing people that it’s not always the end-all, be-all when something bad happens to you. You can come out of it stronger.
And by 2011, the girl who had hidden from everything was a high school senior and competitive cheerleader.
Michelle Renee: She really turned the corner and started enjoying her life again.
Michelle Renee: She loved it. It was her absolute passion.
Tracy Smith: You’re thriving. You’re living the dream. You said you dreamed of this. You were living the dream.
Breea Renee: Yes, I was.
Then suddenly …
Breea Renee: Senior year in December, I started feeling a little off. … I was dropping things.
Michelle Renee: Showed up at my work at 6 o’clock, dragging her leg … going “Mommy, something’s really wrong. Something’s wrong. I don’t know what’s happening.”
Breea Renee: I said … “Mom, I’m really scared.”
They had no idea Breea was in for the fight of her life.
Michelle Renee: We rushed her to the hospital. And they started pricking her leg and she couldn’t feel it. And her heart rate started going crazy.
Tracy Smith: Oh my gosh.
Breea Renee: By 8 p.m. that night, I was paralyzed on my left side, couldn’t talk, couldn’t swallow, blind in my left eye.
Michelle Renee: “We found abnormalities in the brain” is all they could tell me that night.
Tracy Smith: It almost sounds like there’s that same feeling of helplessness that you had the night that you were held hostage.
Michelle Renee: Completely.
The next morning, Breea was diagnosed with an acute onset of multiple sclerosis, an autoimmune disease in which the body’s immune system attacks its own tissues.
Michelle Renee: Based on the scans, she has … tumefactive MS, which is not only rare in and of itself, but people Breea’s age at 18 …rarely get MS.
Breea says she was told she might never walk or talk again.
Tracy Smith: Just like that.
Breea Renee: Just like that. … My life just ended again … I was 18 trying to go off to college, do cheer in college, and that was never gonna happen for me.
Tracy Smith: So much of your healing had been talking …. and now you couldn’t talk?
Breea Renee: Now I couldn’t talk … I couldn’t feed myself anymore.
Michelle Renee: She had to relearn all of that.
Michelle Renee
But it was as if they had been training for this for years.
Tracy Smith: Do you think in some way what happened to you when you were seven prepared you for battling MS?
Breea Renee: Yes … I think it made me strong enough to go through what I went through with MS.
Michelle Renee: It was here we go again, here we go again.
Breea would spend six weeks in the hospital.
Breea Renee: Two to three times a day of physical therapy, occupational … therapy, speech therapy.
Michelle Renee: After she could talk again … she turned to me and said, “Kidnapping was a piece of cake compared to this.”
And just as with the kidnapping, Breea wanted to inspire others.
Michelle Renee: She wrote her college essay from her hospital room, from her wheelchair and said, “I’m going to college. I am going to be the first person in my family to graduate college no matter what.”
BREEA RENEE (video of her reading college essay in the hospital): I now know that there is no time to waste. Life can change so suddenly.
She chronicled her journey on her Facebook page.
Michelle Renee: She fought tooth and nail every single day for every single step she took. She walked outta the hospital.
This time it was Michelle doing the cheerleading.
Dave Estey: The rehab started … in the hospital. But the real rehab was Michelle constantly on her, “we’re gonna do this.”
Michelle Renee: We were a total team. We just ended up going into full gear. We lived in a house with stairs. … She couldn’t do stairs anymore.
Tracy Smith: So once again, you’re out of a home that you’ve been living in?
Michelle Renee: Right, and I had to … become her full-time caregiver for about a year-and-a half, two years. … and rebuilding our life, again.
Despite the odds, she made it to college.
Michelle Renee: She relapsed three times her first year in college and had to come home. But she did it.
Dave Estey: She follows in her mom’s footsteps … I mean with the tenacity, and the never give up … philosophy that they have.
Breea is walking, talking proof.
CBS News
Tracy Smith: So, they told you would never walk again?
Breea Renee: Yeah. I’d never walk again, never see again, never anything like that…
Tracy Smith: And?
Breea Renee: I would say I beat the odds.
Tracy Smith: Yet again.
Breea Renee: Yes, exactly.
But 20 years after their world first came crashing down, they’d be faced with the unimaginable once again. Christopher Butler could be released.
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
From the very beginning, the case hit close to home for prosecutor Tom Manning.
Tom Manning: The fact that there was a little girl. My daughter was the same age as Breea when this happened.
Nearly 20 years later, in June 2020, Christopher Butler was up for parole.
Michelle Renee: He’s the one who lied about me.
Manning made sure he was at the hearing.
Tracy Smith: And you had a plan going in.
Tom Manning: I did.
He saw a chance to set the record straight by asking Butler about the story he’d told on the stand.
Tom Manning: I told Michelle if I felt it was right, I was gonna go for it.
Tracy Smith: What’d you think … about that?
Michelle Renee: Go for it … ask away.
Tracy Smith: Even though that’s risky?
Michelle Renee: It’s a little risky … this guy could go to the grave with these lies.
The risk paid off. Butler recanted his whole story, admitting he and Michelle never had a relationship.
Tracy Smith: How did that feel to hear that?
CBS News
Michelle Renee: Hmm … it’s about time … I wanted everybody who ever doubted me to read this parole transcript. I wanna blast it all over the internet … that there was never, ever a chance … that I would ever, ever have been involved in anything like this, ever.
Breea says it’s a bittersweet victory for her mom.
Breea Renee: It feels good, but it’s a little too late. … You can search my mom’s name and it can come up on the internet. You can’t take that back.
Dave Estey: Why is it take him so long to come clean? And it’s probably because he had an opportunity to be free.
Even though Butler was unequivocal that Michelle was not involved –
Michelle Renee: He still hasn’t really taken responsibility.
He blamed his old flame Lisa Ramirez. But Butler said he was sorry for what he’d put his victims through, and even said he’d read Michelle’s book more than once.
Tracy Smith: He … said some of the passages in your book really got to him.
Michelle Renee: Yeah … on the road trip to Alaska … I really started to think about what it would be like to try to just understand.
Michelle says that’s when she started to wonder about the people behind the masks.
Michelle Renee: This is someone’s son. … This is someone’s brother. This is someone’s grandson. …What happened to them in their life that got them to the point where they thought … the only option was to attack a mother and her daughter?
Tracy Smith: Do you accept Christopher Butler’s apology?
Michelle Renee: I do … Yeah, 1000%. … I appreciate him finally being honest after all this time … I hope he keeps digging deeper.
Breea Renee: Yeah. I forgave him a long time ago and I accept his apology.
But neither Breea nor Michelle want Butler released. He’s already been denied parole twice. The irony isn’t lost on Dave.
Dave Estey: All he really did is free everybody else … he’s held hostage with his lie.
Michelle Renee: In a very weird … way, I could breathe … I could exhale finally after all this time.
ZUMA
While they don’t believe Butler has changed his ways, they feel very differently about the other two men who held them hostage.
Breea Renee: They confessed … they take accountability for what they did. And that’s a big thing.
Tracy Smith: Are you actually rooting for these guys to succeed at this point?
Breea Renee: Yes, yes. … They were younger … than what I am now … if they are doing the work, I want nothing but the best for them.
Especially Robert Ortiz.
Michelle Renee: At the sentencing Robert Ortiz is the only one that turned around and looked at me and said, “I’m sorry” … he mouthed it.
They wrote to Ortiz back in 2011 and received a reply 9 years later.
Michelle Renee: Out of respect for him, I’m not going to say everything that’s in the letter. … I can say that … it’s beautiful. … It’s heartfelt. … And … I can’t wait to see where that leads.
Tracy Smith: This is the young man who held a gun to your daughter’s head.
Michelle Renee: Yes, and she spoke at his parole hearing in his favor.
In the meantime, Michelle has written her follow-up book about the road trip that changed her point of view.
Michelle Renee: It is about healing … it’s called “Nine Days,” which is how long I was on the road to Alaska.
Dave Estey: I do believe that through this terrible … tragedy that something beautiful was meant to come about. … It has built these people into these incredible human beings.
And through it all, they say they wouldn’t change a thing — even the kidnapping.
Tracy Smith: So, if you look back at the last 20 years, what has this journey been about?
Michelle Renee: Raising a remarkable daughter … It’s the best thing I’ve ever done in my life, is be her mom.
Tracy Smith: It seems like both of you look at this at least a tiny bit as a gift.
Breea Renee: Uh-huh. Yeah … I wouldn’t change it. … it … gave us the chance to
build the bond that we have today. And it’s just gotten stronger … Yeah.
Robert Ortiz was granted parole in January 2021.
Learn more about MS from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.
Produced by Gayane Keshishyan Mendez. Michael McHugh is the producer/editor. Emma Steele, Lauren Turner Dunn, and Danielle Arman are the associate producers. Greg McLaughlin and Diana Modica are the editors. Peter Schweitzer is the senior producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer.
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Sneak peek: The Station Nightclub Fire: Who’s Responsible?
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What Ally Kostial Didn’t Know
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The Death of an Officer’s Wife
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Timeline: The death of Amanda Perrault
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When 44-year-old Amanda Perrault died from a gunshot wound to the head, her husband Seth Perrault, an officer with the Eatonton, Georgia, Police Department, told investigators that she had committed suicide. But when the Putnam County Sheriff saw the way her body was lying in the couple’s bed, he says he didn’t see a suicide, he saw a murder.
Fall 2011: A whirlwind romance
Amanda Perrault/Facebook
A recently divorced Amanda Johnson met Seth Perrault online. At the time, Perrault was battling cancer and living with his parents, who were paying his bills.
The couple quickly fell in love and within six months, Johnson moved in with Perrault and became his caregiver. In 2017, Seth’s cancer went into remission.
Amanda Johnson begins to drift away from family
Alesha Johnson/Facebook
As Perrault and Johnson grew closer, two of Amanda’s sisters claim that they lost touch with her. “She didn’t come to, like, any of our Christmas events or, like, any of our events because she had to host for his family and cook for all of them,” Alesha Johnson told “48 Hours.”
Angie Johnson also claims that for years, Perrault would not allow Amanda to get a job or, at times, have a cell phone of her own. They say he was controlling and mistreated their sister.
June 23, 2017: Seth and Amanda tie the knot
Alesha Johnson
After five years together, Seth Perrault and Amanda Johnson quietly got married at the local courthouse, with just their children in attendance.
Alesha and Angie Johnson believe that Seth only asked their sister to marry him because he wanted custody of his daughter from a previous relationship. For over a year, Seth had been in a custody dispute with the girl’s mother and, as his lawyer told “48 Hours” contributor Anne-Marie Green, “If Amanda was gonna be present in his daughter’s life … they had to get married.”
A few months after the couple were married, Seth was awarded full custody of his daughter.
Nov. 1, 2018: Amanda Perrault’s dream home
Zillow
In 2018, Seth Perrault’s father bought his son a beautiful home near Lake Oconee in Eatonton, Georgia. Alesha Johnson told “48 Hours” that Amanda loved their new home and being a stepmother to Seth’s daughter, but her marriage was becoming more and more contentious.
Nov. 19, 2018: Seth Perrault becomes Officer Perrault
Amanda Perrault/Facebook
About a year after they moved into their new home, Seth Perrault was hired by the Eatonton Police department. He had previously applied to the Putnam County Sheriff’s office, but was rejected for lack of experience.
Jan. 28, 2020: Amanda Perrault calls 911
Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office
Amanda Perrault called 911 from a neighbor’s house, and told a Putnam County Sheriff’s dispatcher that her husband —an officer with the Eatonton Police Department — had assaulted her. Deputies responded to the call and saw red marks across Amanda’s chest.
Seth Perrault’s 8-year-old daughter witnessed the incident and told the deputies that she heard the couple arguing and saw her father push Amanda out the door. She also said she was afraid and hid in her closet — but was ordered out by her father.
Jan. 28, 2020: Seth Perrault is arrested
Union Recorder/Billy Hobbs
Deputies subsequently arrested Seth Perrault and charged him with simple battery, family violence, and cruelty to children in the third degree. That night, Amanda Perrault called her sister, Angie Johnson, and asked to be picked up in the morning.
Jan. 29, 2020: Seth Perrault is released from jail on bond
Amanda Perrault/Facebook
The day after Seth Perrault’s arrest, Amanda Perrault told her sister Angie not to come pick her up. Instead, she decided to attend Seth’s bond hearing. When the judge asked Amanda if she wanted a stay away order added to Seth’s bond conditions, she said no. Seth was then released on a $1,500 bond, and Amanda allowed him to return home.
Feb. 3, 2020: Seth Perrault reports his wife’s death
CBS News
Five days after Seth Perrault’s release from jail, Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills was called about an alleged suicide at the Perrault house. Sheriff Howard Sills told “48 Hours” that Seth Perrault told him he and Amanda were in bed arguing, “And then all of a sudden she just produced the gun outta thin air and executed herself.”
After briefly inspecting the house, Sheriff Sills called in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to collect the evidence. Perrault was taken to the Putnam County Sheriff’s Department for more questioning. Seth said Amanda felt bad about his arrest after their fight and that she wanted to “recant her statement”.
Seth said, Amanda, “looked at me and said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I put you through this.” “Boom.”
Feb. 4, 2020: Sheriff’s deputies canvas the Perrault’s neighborhood
CBS News
The day after Amanda’s death, sheriff’s deputies questioned the Perrault’s neighbors and learned that Seth and Amanda had a history of domestic violence. Neighbors said the couple could be heard fighting often and that Seth Perrault seemed to be the aggressor. A neighbor also recounted seeing Seth drag Amanda down the driveway by her hair. Another neighbor said he would often stand in his yard listening to the couple arguing in case he needed to call for help. No one ever called the police because, as they told sheriff’s deputies, Seth was the police.
Feb. 5, 2020: Seth Perrault is arrested a second time
Putnam County Sheriff’s Office
Two days after Amanda Perrault’s death, Sheriff Sills felt he had enough evidence to obtain a warrant for Seth Perrault’s arrest.
Feb. 11, 2020: An Interview with Seth’s Perrault’s daughter
Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office
Days after Seth Perrault’s arrest, his then-8-year-old daughter was interviewed by a forensic child psychologist about what she witnessed the day Seth was arrested on charges of domestic abuse. That interview would later be used as evidence at trial.
July 31, 2020: A jailhouse informant
Putnam County Sheriff’s Department
Jack Faulk and Seth Perrault were on the same dorm block at the Jones County Jail when Faulk reached out to Sheriff Sills. In two handwritten letters to the sheriff, Faulk detailed what he claimed Perrault told him about Amanda’s death, including that Seth said, “He had been giving [Amanda] pain killers all day” and that “she was passed out” at the time of her death.
Aug. 21, 2020: Autopsy report is released
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
Nearly seven months after Amanda Perrault’s death, Georgia Bureau of Investigation forensic pathologist Dr. Lora Darrisaw released her autopsy report declaring the manner of death suicide. Sheriff Sills says he was shocked, but undeterred by that report.
Nov. 3, 2020: A grand jury Indicts Seth Perrault
After spending nearly 9 months in jail, a grand jury decided that despite the coroner’s report, there was enough evidence for Seth Perrault to stand trial in the murder of his wife, Amanda.
Feb. 25, 2022: Seth Perrault is found guilty
Eatonton Messenger
After deliberating for just under two-and-a-half hours, a jury of eight women and four men found Seth Perrault guilty of murder. He was immediately sentenced to life in prison without parole.
After his sentencing, Perrault’s new legal team filed his first appeal, which was rejected.
Amanda’s legacy
CBS News
Every August, on Amanda’s birthday, her sisters honor her memory by releasing love letters tied to purple balloons. This year, they included the number for the National Domestic Violence Hotline. Their hope is that the notes will find the people who need them most.
Angie and Alesha Johnson remember their sister as a free spirit, a beloved best friend, and a dedicated mother.
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The Daughters Who Disappeared
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A Killer in the Family Tree
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Melissa Turner’s Closing Act
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A cosplay model claims she stabbed her fiancé in self-defense; prosecutors say security cameras prove otherwise
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Melissa Turner called 911 saying she had discovered her fiancé Matthew Trussler lying unresponsive near their swimming pool in Riverview, Florida. He was pronounced dead at the scene and an autopsy later revealed he had died from stab wounds. It was Oct. 18, 2019, and Melissa initially told detectives that the couple had been drinking the night before, but that she could remember few details. However, when investigators found a security camera above a neighbor’s garage door that held clues to what happened, her story changed. Prosecutors say Melissa can be heard screaming at Matthew on an audio recording from the camera. She said she stabbed her fiancé, acting in self-defense when he tried to choke her. Melissa Turner was eventually arrested and charged with second degree murder with a weapon.
“I thought this was it. I thought he was going to kill me. And I stabbed him lightly in the back just to get him off me,” Turner told Moriarty. “I didn’t do what they’re saying I did. If I’m going to prison, then I’m going down fighting.”
THE DAY MATTHEW TRUSSLER DIED
911 OPERATOR: Hillsborough County Fire and Rescue. What’s the address of the emergency?
MELISSA TURNER: Please —
911 OPERATOR: Tell me what’s wrong.
MELISSA TURNER: He is nonresponsive.
Melissa Turner: I couldn’t stop crying.
Melissa Turner can vividly describe the moment as medics tried to revive her fiancé, Matthew Trussler.
Melissa Turner: I watched the EMTs unfold the sheet and, um, lay the white sheet over him.
Two years later, Melissa still struggles to talk about the day Matthew died.
Melissa Turner: And it was — it was when that happened that I couldn’t hold in the tears and everything.
It was around 8:30 a.m. when Melissa says she found Matthew unresponsive on the back patio of the house they shared in a suburb of Tampa, Florida.
Melissa Turner: I tried to see if he was breathing. And I tried to — to start CPR.
Just a couple hours later, still covered in blood, Melissa agreed to talk to the investigators at the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office. She says she wanted to help them figure out what had happened to Matthew.
Melissa Turner: I was just saying “yes” and complying with whatever was kind of said or told to me. … the world around me didn’t really feel real in those moments.
MELISSA TURNER (interrogation): This is a lot less glamorous than they make it on TV.
Melissa told the detectives the couple’s day had started off just like any other. They took care of their pets, did house chores as seen in previously posted Facebook videos and went grocery shopping. She admitted they were also drinking alcohol throughout the day leading into the evening.
MELISSA TURNER (interrogation): I mean, that’s what we do. We had just, we were there at the house ourselves … We had drinks. He always liked drinking. He was a drinker.
According to Melissa, around 11 p.m. she got tired and told Matthew she wanted to go to sleep. He was still up.
MELISSA TURNER: I slept on that — that big chair that’s in my little office area downstairs.
What she saw when she woke up the next morning, Melissa told investigators, didn’t make sense.
MELISSA TURNER: I saw the — the kitchen was — I didn’t see him outside at first. … I went upstairs, and I checked the bedroom … And I came back down again.
She says that’s when she discovered Matthew outside on the patio and began CPR.
DETECTIVE: You have his blood all over you.
MELISSA TURNER: I don’t understand.
DETECTIVE: You were trying to give CPR and help him.
Defense Attorney John Trevena
They are hard to see, but Melissa is wearing latex gloves given to her by an officer at the scene.
DETECTIVE: He had you put them on because of the amount of blood.
MELISSA TURNER: I was getting things bloody cause I was covered in his blood.
DETECTIVE 2: Do you want to keep wearing those gloves, or do you wanna take them off?
MELISSA TURNER: I’ll leave them on for now.
DETECTIVE: Do you have any injuries on your person?
MELISSA TURNER: No (cries).
DETECTIVE: Any scratches or cuts or anything?
MELISSA TURNER: Not that I’ve noticed (cries).
The detectives eventually told Melissa she would need to take the gloves off so they could take photographs of her.
MELISSA TURNER (points to her right palm): I have a little cut right here.
DETECTIVE: And that’s from what?
MELISSA TURNER: I think it’s from grabbing the glass? Or — cause there — I know there was the broken glass this morning.
POLICE PHOTOGRAPHER: Open your hands a little more there. … Did that hurt to open it up? Sorry.
MELISSA TURNER: Oh my gosh, I didn’t know.
DETECTIVE: That one’s sliced pretty good.
MELISSA TURNER: I didn’t even notice.
DETECTIVE: Oh, wow.
MELISSA TURNER: I had no idea that was there.
As detectives worked to get to the bottom of what happened, Matthew’s family was learning Matthew had died. His brother Sean Trussler got the call from their mother.
Sean Trussler: I got a call that he died in an accident is what they told me.
Sean called his fiancée Jennifer immediately.
Jennifer Giles: He’s sobbing so hard and just screaming at the top of his lungs, “He’s gone. My brother, Mattie. Mattie’s gone. He’s dead.” … I’m getting chills just talkin’ about this.
Sean and Matthew Trussler were originally from Massachusetts. In 2015, Matthew followed in his brother’s footsteps and moved to Florida to work with him in the construction business. Sean, who lost one of his eyes due to a work accident shortly after his brother’s death, says the two made a good team.
Sean Trussler: I have worked Mattie very hard. … He just needed to be led correctly.
Matthew, or Mattie as Sean calls him, struggled with substance abuse and was looking at the move to Florida as a chance to start over.
Sean Trussler: He was a really good kid. … He worked so hard. He had the biggest heart. He loved everybody and everything.
Melissa Turner
Two years after his move, Melissa, then 24, met Matthew, 23 on an online dating app.
Melissa Turner: We met on Tinder … and I just liked how different Matt treated me … he made me feel more important. … he drew me in.
In 2019, the couple took a big step and bought a house together.
Melissa Turner: We were excited about the house … we were picking out, you know — paint colors for walls and furniture.
But Melissa says a few months into their new lives, their relationship became strained.
Melissa Turner: Matt’s drinking was getting worse … It was just becoming really — excessive.
At the sheriff’s office, Melissa had been adamant that there were no arguments between the couple that night.
MELISSA TURNER (interrogation): We were having a great time.
DETECTIVE: Was there anything physical, violent?
MELISSA TURNER: He was never violent. … He was always amazing with me.
But Melissa didn’t know that the detectives had been tipped off by the responding officer that Melissa had told him there had been an argument at the house the night before.
DETECTIVE: What were you and Matthew arguing about last night?
MELISSA TURNER: I don’t really remember. I mean, we might have got in argument. But it didn’t seem like anything … We weren’t, like, screaming at each other that I know of.
DETECTIVE: You told us that you guys were there. It was only the two of you. The two of you were drinking … my problem is, is I got Matthew on the back porch with stab wounds.
MELISSA TURNER: Stab wounds?
Meanwhile, another detective, Ryan LaGasse, was knocking on doors and canvassing the neighborhood for clues.
Ryan LaGasse: As I walked over here, you’ve got … the camera located directly above the residence … across the street here.
And what was captured by the home security camera, police say, would prove Melissa knew more than she was letting on.
MELISSA TURNER (security camera audio): Get up now! Get up! Get up! I hate you!
DIGITAL OBSERVERS
An eyewitness can be crucial to solving a crime, and just hours into the investigation of Matthew Trussler’s death, detectives discovered digital observers. There was an ADT camera inside the couple’s home, but at first glance, it didn’t appear to show any unusual activity.
Ryan LaGasse: Most of our information came from that camera that’s posted up above the garage.
It was a security camera on a neighbor’s garage that would prove invaluable — an unblinking eye trained on the side of Melissa and Matthew’s home that recorded sights and sounds.
Ryan LaGasse: So, I started looking at the footage.
LaGasse, a detective for the sheriff’s office at the time, saw only darkness and heard the near silence of suburbia until around 4 a.m.
Ryan LaGasse: I started to hear racketing. You know, things that were — sounded like they were crashing. And, um, so then, I kinda zoomed in my senses a little bit … And then, from there I started hearing voices … and then I hear what sounds like screaming, um, yelling.
LaGasse says those voices were coming from Matthew and Melissa’s house.
Erin Moriarty: How would you describe the tone of the voices that you heard?
Ryan LaGasse: So, the little bit of male voice … was tough to distinguish. But the female voice was very, um, very loud. Sounded very angry.
Erin Moriarty: What could you hear? What kind of phrases?
Ryan LaGasse: So, I heard —”Get up.” I heard — “So” and then there was an explicit “die.”
Erin Moriarty: You heard, “So die”?
MELISSA TURNER (security camera audio): “Go f***ing die!”
Ryan LaGasse: And then I heard — you know, it sounded like … a female voice was crying, saying, “What — what did I do?”
LaGasse immediately reached out to his colleagues, who were interviewing Melissa.
DETECTIVE: You said that last night you never woke up at all.
MELISSA TURNER: No. … I remember laying down. I remember waking up in the same spot.
Investigators now believed they had evidence that Melissa wasn’t telling all she knew.
DETECTIVE: Tell me about what happened around 4 o’clock this morning.
MELISSA TURNER: 4 o’clock? What happened at 4 o’clock?
DETECTIVE: I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you.
MELISSA TURNER: I don’t know either. Why?
DETECTIVE: Was there any arguing —
MELISSA TURNER: At 4 o’clock?
DETECTIVE: — 4 o’clock this morning?
MELISSA TURNER: Not that I know of.
MELISSA TURNER: I believe I was asleep. … I have no memory of any argument at 4 o’clock in the morning.
But after detectives confronted her with the evidence, Melissa’s story changed.
DETECTIVE: I have some video surveillance … actually, yelling and screaming between a male and a female coming from your house.
DETECTIVE 2: What we need from you that would probably … make a lot more sense is to … tell us what that argument was about.
MELISSA TURNER: I would say he woke me up and we got in an argument over that. Because he was still up at four in the morning drinking.
DETECTIVE 2: OK. So, just so I’m clear, you do have memory of what happened, right?
MELISSA TURNER: Yes.
DETECTIVE: At 4 o’clock.
MELISSA TURNER: Yes.
DETECTIVE: Why were you yellin’ at him, “Bitch, get up. Bitch, get up”?
MELISSA TURNER: … actually, a lot of the times whenever he’s drinking and gets that drunk into the hours of the morning — he will just fall over.
DETECTIVE: You also said a couple of other things like, “Stay down. So f***ing die.” what are you talking about?
MELISSA TURNER: That was me being pissed off at him that he fell over.
DETECTIVE: You got a slice on your hand — a slice. That’s what that is. How did that happen?
The investigators again focused on that cut on Melissa’s hand.
DETECTIVE: It’s not from glass. I can tell you that.
Once again, her story changed.
MELISSA TURNER: He does get his knives out sometimes. … He wasn’t him anymore. … thinking back on it, this is from me grabbing a knife out of his hand. … And things got escalated from there.
Melissa later told “48 Hours” she wasn’t trying to hide the injury on her hand. In fact, she had mentioned it earlier to the 911 operator.
MELISSA TURNER (911 call): I have a cut on my hand …
Melissa Turner: I barely remembered, even after mentioning it on the 911 call, that my hand was sliced open (cries).
Defense Attorney John Trevena
A few hours after Melissa placed that 911 call, she was arrested and charged with second degree murder with a weapon. Sean and Jennifer learned Melissa was in custody for Matthew’s murder from his mom, who called Melissa by her middle name, Rose.
Jennifer Giles: She said, “Rose killed him.” … I remember … we stood in my kitchen, and he just starts bawling.
Up until then, Sean and Jennifer say the couple didn’t appear to have any problems, but Sean says that Melissa did put a wedge between him and Matthew.
Sean Trussler: She just totally isolated him, and her, from the rest of the world. … and the truth is, like … how controlling and manipulating Rose was.
Sean says he hadn’t seen Matthew during the last six months of his life. The brothers had had a falling out after Matthew stopped working with Sean at his construction business.
Sean Trussler: She took Mattie long before she took him forever.
Sean and Jennifer say Melissa had two sides: as Matthew’s live-in partner and as a cosplay model, who dressed up in costume portraying famous fictional characters.
Meliisa Turner/Tumblr
Erin Moriarty: What is that then?
Jennifer Giles: That is actually from –
Sean Trussler: — “Scooby Doo.”
She made a living by producing and acting in her own adult videos.
Jennifer Giles: But it’s from a movie clip where she actually is performing, um, sexual acts.
And it wasn’t until after his death that they learned Melissa had cast Matthew as her partner in her videos.
Jennifer Giles: And I really feel like — the pressure, and the stress, and the fact that it was more, and more, and more just paid its toll on him.
Erin Moriarty: You think that maybe he just didn’t want to do those films anymore?
Jennifer Giles: Absolutely.
Sean Trussler: I think he was done with her.
IN SEARCH OF ANSWERS
After Sean and his fiancée Jennifer found out that Melissa had been arrested for Matthew’s murder, they began an investigation of their own.
Jennifer Giles: We came across things that were pretty disturbing.
Matthew Trussler
Sean and Jennifer believe Matthew was becoming disenchanted with his role in those videos Melissa produced.
Jennifer Giles: I think at first it was OK, because he was seeing some fruits from his labor.
Sean Trussler: Money. Real money.
Jennifer Giles: But I think it got a little much.
They now wonder if Melissa had been looking for a partner for her videos when she spotted Matthew on that dating site.
Sean Trussler: People write little bios about themselves.
Jennifer Giles: … she went out and found someone with all the right stuff, the looks … the body and everything that goes with it.
Cameron Walega: She doesn’t do things without a bunch of research.
Cameron Walega, a former boyfriend of Melissa, met her before she began her career in the world of adult entertainment.
Cameron Walega: She was very artistic, so she was able to edit her own videos, edit her own pictures … very business driven.
The two met in 2012 when they were studying make-up effects at Douglas Education Center near Pittsburgh. Back then, Melissa was running a popular fitness blog after losing 100 pounds, later documenting her transformation on social media.
Cameron Walega: … it kept her accountable … she had this audience that was incredibly invested in what she was doing … watching her evolve as a person.
In 2013, Cameron and Melissa moved to Florida to pursue careers in special effects. There, Melissa confessed to Cameron that she had started a second blog with racier content.
Cameron Walega: … this was meant to be temporary. This was supplemental.
But Cameron says Melissa soon began earning a decent living doing what is called cam work, where she performed — in various stage of dress — for her internet followers who paid a fee.
Cameron Walega: She was so proud of where she got herself … “I used to be this incredibly insecure girl. Now they’re paying me to look at me.”
Melissa Turner/Facebook
He says he began to see a change in Melissa’s personality as her business grew.
Cameron Walega: It became maniacal to a point where it was a complete obsession. And it was money, money, money … And the more and more success that she found, the more and more unstable she became.
Cameron Walega: She would scream at times that it would pierce your ear. … There were times where she was just unpredictable. Absolutely unpredictable.
Sean and Jennifer now wonder if Melissa’s volatility may have escalated an argument with Matthew on the night he died. Did he want out of the adult entertainment business?
Sean Trussler: I think maybe that night he was like “Yo, I’m done with this. I’m washin’ my hands.”
Jennifer Giles: She didn’t like whatever he said to her. And it made her blow her top.
But that’s not how it happened, says Melissa.
Melissa Turner (cries): After he was upset for me wanting to go to bed — But you know I stayed downstairs … his demeanor would start to get darker and darker from there.
Defense Attorney John Trevena
Melissa Turner: Matt … had his knife out. It was the black — tactical switchblade.
Melissa Turner: There were times where he would get really upset and he would try and use it on himself. … and, so, it was a common thing for me to try and take a knife away from him.
Melissa Turner: On this night … He didn’t want to let go of the knife.
Melissa says Matthew was drunk and despondent. They struggled over the knife, she says, but after she managed to take it away, she says Matthew grabbed her by the neck and squeezed — a detail she failed to tell detectives during her interrogation.
Melissa Turner (cries): I thought this was it. I thought he was going to kill me. … And then I stabbed him lightly in the back just to get him off me.
She says after she stabbed him once in the back, Matthew pushed her into the kitchen counter, and she hit her head.
Melissa Turner: … he came at me. And that’s how I fell back and hit my head. … I … had a pretty severe head injury.
CBS News
But that claim would later be challenged at her trial.
Melissa Turner: I remembered a few blurry steps … towards my office. But that was it. I just remember passing out—blacking out there.
John Trevena: She’s the real victim … She’s the one that was suffering the abuse.
John Trevena is Melissa’s attorney. He describes the couple’s relationship as toxic.
John Trevena: … particularly since she said it was escalating. … His drinking was escalating, his behavior issues were escalating … And it just unfortunately escalated into this very odd incident.
John Trevena: I don’t think it is a murder case. I think it is a case of — self-defense.
But Melissa’s version of events will be picked apart by prosecutors Katherine Fand and Chinwe Fossett at her trial.
Katherine Fand: There’s just nothing to support her statement.
Chinwe Fossett: She never mentions anything about anyone strangling her or anything, until days before trial … you really have to take that into consideration.
Besides the audio from the neighbor’s security camera, the state plans to present video from inside the couple’s home. Remember that ADT security footage recovered by investigators? Prosecutors believed it didn’t show any suspicious activity the night of Matthew’s death. But just before the trial, they discovered they misread the time and date.
Katherine Fand: I’ll be honest, I misunderstood the timing. It’s not recorded in Eastern Standard Time. It is recorded in Universal Time.
And what the video did capture, say prosecutors, would undermine Melissa’s defense.
KATHERINE FAND (closing arguments) We’re gonna show you some ADT videos.
KATHERINE FAND (closing arguments): He’s calmly walking … and you can see, she’s hunched over, she’s yelling. … She is angry and upset.
MELISSA TURNER TAKES THE STAND
On Valentine’s Day 2022, two years after Matthew Trussler was found dead on his patio, his fiancée Melissa Turner went on trial for murder.
Melissa had been out on bail since her arrest in 2019. But if she’s convicted, she knows she could spend the rest of her life behind bars.
Melissa Turner: It’ll be a world of weight off my shoulders for this trial to just be over.
Melissa Turner/Facebook
The jury will hear nothing about her videos — her cosplay modeling and acting out fantasies online. The judge ruled it wasn’t relevant to the case. Prosecutor Chinwe Fossett sees it differently.
Chinwe Fossett: I did think that the jury should’ve known that she was an actress. … And she was able to make herself into this victim-type person, and then cry on demand.
Melissa’s attorney, John Trevena, told the jury that she didn’t mean to kill Matthew. That she stabbed him in self-defense during that struggle over the knife.
JOHN TREVENA (in court): Who killed Matthew Trussler? Matthew Trussler killed Matthew Trussler.
John Trevena: He did. He did it to himself because of his actions and his behaviors. … His drinking, his emotional abuse.
Erin Moriarty: You’re saying that Melissa had the right to kill him because he was drunk?
John Trevena: No. … Melissa had the right to kill him to defend herself from being strangled.
But Prosecutor Fosset says Matthew had no record or history of violence against anyone.
Erin Moriarty: Why do you believe that Melissa killed Matthew Trussler.
Chinwe Fossett: I think she was intoxicated, and I do think that she went far beyond anything she thought she would do. … Maybe she was just so frustrated with his drinking. … that she harms him so badly that he ends up dying.
At trial, Melissa decided to take a risk and testify. She described Matthew as an alcoholic who had exhibited abusive and unsettling behaviors in the past
MELISSA TURNER (in court): There were times where he would push me … and punch the walls beside my head.
MELISSA TURNER (in court): I had seen him cut himself, burn himself, stab himself.
MELISSA TURNER (in court): He would stare off at some corner … And he would tell me that “there’s a demon standing right there.” … There were times where … he would talk in a different voice (cries).
JOHN TREVENA: Did that frighten you?
MELISSA TURNER: God, yes. I was terrified.
Erin Moriarty: And this was happening on that night?
Melissa Turner (cries): Yeah. … He just had this little smile on his face. And he said, “What’s a matter, little girl? Are you scared? ‘Cause Matt’s not here anymore.”
Authorities never checked Melissa’s blood alcohol level, but Matthew’s was nearly five times the legal limit in Florida.
JOHN TREVENA: That level of blood alcohol not only is lethal, it can cause hallucinations, the demon that we’ve heard about.
CHINWE FOSSETT: But the medical examiner didn’t say that he died of alcohol — intoxication … The cause of death … is that he was stabbed, and he bled to death.
According to the medical examiner, Matthew had several small cuts and bruises and a possible defensive wound on his forearm. The fatal injury was not the stab wound to his back, but from a deep incision on his right arm, which punctured a vein.
CHINWE FOSSETT (in court): You stabbed him in the back, correct?
MELISSA TURNER: Correct.
CHINWE FOSSETT: OK.
Melissa Turner: The only thing that I did was the back.
Erin Moriarty: How did he get cut on his right arm?
Melissa Turner: I — I couldn’t tell you that. I have no clue. He could’ve fallen into something; he could’ve done it himself. … And I stabbed him once to get him off of me from strangling me.
Erin Moriarty: Why didn’t you tell the police that he had been trying to strangle you?
Melissa Turner: … because I couldn’t remember at the time. … I had complained multiple times about a headache.
Prosecutor Fossett questioned Melissa about her memories that returned before the trial.
CHINWE FOSSETT (in court): And so today, in 2022, you now claim you had some kind of head injury, correct?
MELISSA TURNER: Umm, yes.
But a crime scene tech testified there was no evidence of head injury.
CHINWE FOSSETT: And now in 2022, you speak of some kind of blackout, correct? Yes?
MELISSA TURNER: Correct.
CHINWE FOSSET: OK.
The jury won’t have to rely just on Melissa’s memories as they weigh the evidence. There’s also that video from inside the couple’s home. Prosecutors say it proves Melissa was the aggressor that night. At 3:38 a.m., Melissa is seen running towards her office. At 3:42 a.m., Matthew walks past the camera, Melissa follows him.
Defense Attorney John Trevena
Chinwe Fossett: He’s walking calmly, unarmed in the ADT videos, and she’s following him hunched over angry.
At 4:01 a.m., the video shows Melissa running from the direction of the kitchen; she appears distressed. This is also around the time when the camera across the street picks up audio of screaming and yelling. Then in the next video clip is at 4:08 a.m.
ADT SCREENGRAB: MELISSA STARING AT DOOR 4:01 A.M. – John Trevena
Katherine Fand: … she’s standing at a front door … and she’s seeming like she’s talking to open air … and you can see on her hand, you can see the hint of red … she already has the cut.
Prosecutors say the cut on her hand occurred when Melissa stabbed Matthew — they believe he was still alive at that point. Prosecutors say she could have left then for help or called 911.
Chinwe Fossett: That’s not what she did. She … walks back to …where he is.
Katherine Fand: She is not in reasonable fear of him. That’s what’s clear.
But Melissa’s attorney John Trevena rejects the state’s timeline and disputes what prosecutors say is seen on that video.
John Trevena: I never saw any cut on her hand, and I don’t think it shows that.
The fighting continues, say prosecutors, because around 4:30 a.m., they say the couple moved close to an open window and that security camera across the street recorded a woman’s angry voice.
MELISSA TURNER (NEIGHBOR’S SECURITY CAMERA AUDIO): “You have the power to do something, so ****ing die.”
CHINWE FOSSETT (in court): You said, 4:33 a.m., “So f***ing die.” Right?
MELISSA TURNER: No. … I have no recollection of that. … I explained my side and why I did what I did (cries).
CHINWE FOSSETT: You’re crying right now. Is that, is that what’s happening? Are you crying right now?
MELISSA TURNER: Do you know what tears look like?
CHINWE FOSSETT: Are you crying because you can just cry on cue?
MELISSA TURNER: I’m crying because, because my life is on the line right now.
Trevena says it’s impossible to clearly understand what Melissa is saying on the Nest recording. And a former FBI audio forensic expert, Bruce Koenig, testified for the defense how he believed sections of the nest audio had been, what he called, “volume enhanced.”
JOHN TREVENA (in court): So, it could be that maybe one voice on the recording was not amplified and that another voice on the recording was greatly amplified.
BRUCE KOENIG: That’s true.
John Trevena: I find it highly suspicious that … Miss Turner’s voice is screeching loud. … But when it came to — Matthew Trussler … you could barely hear mumbling.
Prosecutors deny the audio was manipulated.
Based on the outside camera, Prosecutor Fand says the confrontation ended at 5:11 a.m., when Matthew somehow got out to the pool area through a window.
Katherine Fand: So, the window was actually open. But when he decided to flee from her he … pushed out the screen and went out the window.
Prosecutors say by the time Matthew collapsed by the pool, Melissa would have seen how injured he was.
Katherine Fand: He has already bled all that blood in the kitchen and then gone out.
Chinwe Fossett: She knows that he needs help. And she’s awake and she doesn’t help him.
But Melissa says that’s when she returned to her office and blacked out.
Erin Moriarty: The argument ends sometime around 5 o’clock. But you don’t call 911 until 8:45.
Melissa Turner: Correct, because I was unconscious.
One of the last ADT clips shows Melissa at 8:35 a.m. walking from the direction of her office. In the police report, her hair is described as “messy as if she just woke up.”
John Trevena: That was the most … demonstrative of her not knowing he’s dead. … Because you wouldn’t be go lookin’ for him if you killed him.
Erin Moriarty: Is it possible … that she did pass out there? She’s been drinking, whatever. And had no idea that he was dying at that time?
Katherine Fand: She knew he was dying because she saw him bleeding out.
As the jury began their deliberations, one of the jurors, Donald Goodwin, was feeling the weight of his decision.
Erin Moriarty: How does the first vote go?
Donald Goodwin: Two for guilty in the second-degree.
Erin Moriarty: And where were you?
Donald Goodwin: Unknown.
A JURY DECIDES
Erin Moriarty: What do you hope the jury comes back with?
Melissa Turner (cries): What everyone hopes for, not guilty.
On Feb. 18, 2022, Melissa Turner’s murder trial wrapped up after five days of testimony before Judge Samantha Ward.
JUDGE WARD: Your duty is to determine if the defendant has been proven guilty or not in accord with the law …
Melissa Turner
Melissa is hoping the jury will believe her story about seeing Matthew alive before blacking out.
Melissa Turner: He was still up and, and moving around…
She says she had no idea of how badly he had been injured.
Melissa Turner: …So the last I remembered of him he was still up.
Erin Moriarty: Isn’t it possible … that there may not have been really — intent to kill anybody. It’s this drunken fight and somebody ends up bleeding to death.
Chinwe Fossett: That’s a homicide.
And Prosecutor Chinwe Fossett says this case is really about domestic violence.
Chinwe Fossett: He was cut and stabbed and left to die. I think that’s the very definition, especially considering that this was by his fiancée.
In Florida, second-degree murder cases are heard by six jurors. In this case, two women and four men — one of them, Donald Goodwin.
Donald Goodwin: You see a young lady and you’re already, like, your stomach drops. You’re like, Lord, just let me do the right thing … But behind the looks of a young lady, the truth was coming out quickly.
Donald Goodwin: When she went to the stand, I think it hurt her, big time. … her tears were so fake. And you can tell.
CBS News
MELISSA TURNER (in court): I’m crying because I still remember all those places, all those plans …
Donald Goodwin: … She was super angry and super sad. Her emotions were everywhere. I’m like that tells me who she is.
Goodwin, a part time family pastor, says those security camera videos were crucial because of what he says was a lack of other evidence.
Donald Goodwin: I looked at the videos over and over, the ADT videos that’s inside the house. … I seen red on her hands. But I couldn’t use it as evidence because the camera wasn’t crystal clear.
Erin Moriarty: At that point, did you think he had already been stabbed?
Donald Goodwin: Yes.
Donald Goodwin: And I think she snapped.
Erin Moriarty: You don’t believe he was strangling her at the time?
Donald Goodwin: No. … I felt like she had enough … and attacked him.
And there was one clip of the audio recording that convinced Goodwin Melissa knew Matthew was hurt.
Donald Goodwin: … then she said … “What did I do?” And I was, like, that right there tells me you know exactly what’s going on now. … she knew he was gonna die, she knew it, and yet, she called nobody.
And as for Melissa’s claims about hitting her head and blacking out?
Erin Moriarty: You don’t believe that she might’ve passed out?
Donald Goodwin: No. Not at all. … there was no evidence of head injury.
The jury deliberated for seven hours.
COURT CLERK: We the jury find as follows as to the charge … the defendant is guilty of murder in the second degree.
Guilty of the murder of Matthew Trussler.
JENNIFER GILES: I remember Sean squeezing my hand, it was a happy feeling.
John Trevena: She was inconsolable. I mean, it was — it was very difficult. I mean, she was crying profusely.
JUDGE WARD: She will be taken into custody at this time.
CBS News
On March 18, 2022, Melissa returned to court to learn her sentence. She talked about what she had lost.MELISSA TURNER (in court, cries) On October 18th, Matthew lost his life, and I lost a man that I loved. I lost my future and my hopes and my dreams.
But Matthew’s family also spoke, struggling with both grief and anger.
JENNIFER GILES: Mattie … 25 years old, wow, so much life still ahead. The life of a son, a brother, a brother-in-law, and an uncle. … Sean … will never see his best friend again. He will never be able to replace you.
MARGARET: The story that you have contrived has caused me as much pain as his death … If Matthew’s drinking was escalating … it was because of the lifestyle that you involved him in. It was not consistent with who he was and with the way that he was raised.
JUDGE WARD: This jury did not believe her claims of self-defense, nor does this court.
Still, Judge Samantha Ward offered Melissa some mercy, sparing her a life sentence.
JUDGE WARD: Based on the jury’s verdict, you are adjudicated guilty, sentenced to 20.5 years in the Florida State Prison.
Melissa Turner will be eligible for release before she turns 50.
Matthew Trussler/Facebook
Erin Moriarty: What do you guys miss about Mattie the most?
Jennifer Giles: Oh, my gosh.
Sean Trussler: His laugh probably.
Jennifer Giles: He had a great laugh.
Sean Trussler: He was a good kid, he was … He was just starting to be a man.
One life lost, another ruined on a night juror Goodwin says didn’t have to happen.
Donald Goodwin: Matthew Trussler didn’t have to die. … They could’ve walked away from each other and started a different life. … Melissa Turner chose to kill Matthew Trussler. Do I think it was premediated? Absolutely not. Do I think she’s guilty? Absolutely.
The prosecutor says Matthew Trussler was a victim of domestic violence.
If you or someone you know needs help, please contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or visit TheHotline.org.
Produced by Asena Basak. Ryan Smith, and Marc Goldbaum are the development producers. Jordan Kinsey is the field producer. Phil Tangel, Wini Dini and George Baluzy are the editors. Anthony Batson is the senior broadcast producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer
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The Idaho Student Murders
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The Idaho Student Murders – CBS News
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Never-before-seen photos and details about the man accused of murdering four Idaho college students
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Under a dark Idaho sky, investigators flew Bryan Kohberger to the college town of Moscow. Police delivered him to the Latah County Jail. On Jan. 5, in an orange jumpsuit, his face vacant, the 28-year-old made what will likely be his first of many appearances in this court.
Ted S. Warren / AP
He stands charged with the murder of four students from the University of Idaho: Kaylee Goncalves, Madison “Maddie” Mogen, Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle. Investigators say he stabbed them to death in the home the women shared.
JUDGE: The maximum penalty for this offense, if you plead guilty or be found guilty is up to death and imprisonment for life. Do you understand?
BRYAN KOHBERGER: Yes.
Kohberger has not yet entered a plea.
In an affidavit, investigators laid out their understanding of the grim details about the night of the killings: They say the killer left his DNA on a “leather knife sheath” found on a bed next to Maddie Mogen. And, most hauntingly, they say a surviving roommate thought she heard crying and “saw a figure clad in black clothing and a mask.”
The man walked past, as she stood in “frozen shock.” She locked herself in her room.
The investigation is fast-moving. Authorities have not disclosed a motive or if he had a connection to the students, but we are learning more about just who Bryan Kohberger is.
WHO IS ACCUSED KILLER BRYAN KOHBERGER?
Just 15 days before his arrest, Bryan Kohberger and his father were driving home from Washington State University for winter break to the family’s home in Pennsylvania.
OFFICER (body cam video): Hello
MICHAEL KOHBERGER: How you doing?
OFFICER: How ya’ll doin today?
The journey interrupted by two traffic stops, almost 10 minutes apart, in Indiana for tailgating.
Indiana State Police
MICHAEL KOHBERGER (to officer): We’re gonna be going to Pennsylvania, a couple more miles.
OFFICER: Oh, OK.
MICHAEL KOHBERGER: …to the Pocono Mountains. We’re a little, we’re slightly punchy. We’ve been driving for hours.
Police body cam video shows Kohberger and his father talking calmly with an officer about the trip.
OFFICER: Hours? And days?
BRYAN KOHBERGER: Hours.
MICHAEL KOHBERGER: Hours. Well, we’ve been driving for almost a day.
OFFICER: Do me a favor and don’t follow too close, OK?
Then they are released with a warning.
Kohberger had been at the university since August, studying to get his Ph.D. in criminology. He was also a teaching assistant in the Department of Criminal Justice. He lived in an apartment complex on campus and had an office there.
According to the newly released affidavit, Kohberger had applied for an internship with the Pullman Police Department in the fall. He wrote in his application essay that “he had interest in assisting rural law enforcement agencies with how to better collect and analyze technological data.”
Benjamin Roberts took four classes with Kohberger.
Benjamin Roberts: He seemed very comfortable around other people. He was very quick to offer his opinion and thoughts. And he was always participating fairly eagerly in classroom discussions.
Alamy
He says Kohberger appeared highly intelligent.
Peter Van Sant: Does anything else come to mind that Bryan said to you in the past that today you think might be of interest?
Benjamin Roberts: There was a comment that he made, and it was kind of a flippant guy talk thing. At one point, he just idly mentioned, you know, “I can go down to a bar or a club and pretty much have any lady I want.”
Kohberger arrived at the university after earning his bachelor’s in psychology and master’s degree in criminal justice at DeSales University in Center Valley, Pennsylvania.
While at DeSales, authorities say Bryan Kohberger posted this survey, approved by the university, on the website Reddit asking ex-cons about the crimes they committed. One question he asked: “Before making your move, how did you approach the victim or target?
James Gagliano: This could be a piece of circumstantial evidence.
James Gagliano is a retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent and CBS News consultant.
James Gagliano: The fact that the suspect was interested in pursuing a Ph.D. in criminal justice and was especially interested in … the mental state that people who had committed murders in the past … yes, it could be interesting to note. But I know a lot of researchers that study those things, too, that would never commit a quadruple homicide.
And if Kohberger was involved in these murders, genetic genealogist CeCe Moore questions why he would be so careless as to allegedly leave his DNA at the crime scene.
CeCe Moore: People are talking about how smart he supposedly is. And I just can’t see how that could be true, because any student of forensic science or criminology would have to know that it’s virtually impossible not to leave your DNA behind at a very violent, intimate crime scene like this.
CeCe Moore: You know, Ted Bundy thought he was smart. But he wasn’t that smart, as it turns out.
After the murders, Roberts says Kohberger appeared disheveled, tired and chattier than usual.
But nothing could prepare Roberts for what he learned of Kohberger’s arrest.
Benjamin Roberts: Looking back over the last four months, I feel like there should have been signs that I should have seen. And I didn’t … I was blindsided.
Jason LaBar: This is out of character for Bryan, these allegations.
Monroe County public defender Jason LaBar represented Kohberger before he was extradited to Idaho.
Jason LaBar: The family would want the general public to know that Bryan is a caring son and brother —that’s he’s responsible, that he is devoted to them.
In a statement the family said, “we care deeply for the for the four families who have lost their precious children” … and that they “seek the truth and promote his presumption of innocence rather than judge unknown facts and make erroneous assumptions.”
Jason LaBar: He is innocent until proven otherwise.
LaBar says Kohberger came from a close-knit family. He grew up in eastern Pennsylvania in the Pocono Mountains. His father was as a maintenance worker and his mom worked in the school system. Bryan has two older sisters – one who works as a family therapist, and another sister who appeared in a 2011 low budget slasher film, “Two Days Back,” about a group of young students viciously murdered by a serial killer. She now works as a school counselor.
Bree: My heart goes out to Bryan’s family.
Bree
Kohberger’s friend, Bree, says she met Bryan at a party when they attended Pleasant Valley High School. She asked “48 Hours” not to use her last name.
Bree: Bryan was really funny. He wasn’t outgoing at all. But he also wasn’t shy.
She says they bonded over their love of the outdoors.
Bree: I don’t necessarily remember the conversations, but you definitely remember how someone makes you feel. … I just remember feeling OK — I was just with a friend. … Just felt natural.
Yearbook photo
Bree recalls Kohberger was an average student with only a few close friends. In a yearbook photo, Kohberger’s caption said he aspired to be an Army Ranger.
Casey Artnz also knew Kohberger from high school. She posted this Tik Tok following Bryan’s arrest.
CASEY ARNTZ TIK TOK: “I used to be friends with Bryan Kohberger” … “I’m in actual shock right now.”
Casey Arntz: He was an overweight kid. … So, he did get bullied a lot.
Yearbook photos
But Arntz says people saw a change in Kohberger the beginning of senior year.
Casey Arntz: He lost like 100 pounds. … He was a rail. … It was after that weight loss that a lot of people noticed a huge switch in him.
Casey Arntz: My brother has since come out to say that even though they were friends, Bryan bullied him.
Casey Arntz: He had said that he would put him in like a chokeholds and stuff like that.
Bree says Kohberger started using heroin, which ended their friendship.
Bree: You just saw him becoming more self-destructive. … He really stayed secluded.
It’s unclear when exactly Kohberger went into recovery, but both Bree and Casey say years after he graduated high school it appeared as if he was getting his life together. He was going to Northampton Community College and working security for Pleasant Valley School District.
Bree: He was telling me that he wanted to get sober, that he was getting sober. … And he wanted to let me know like, “I’m gonna do better. I’m gonna be better.”
Bree: I’m sorry … (emotional)
Casey Arntz
Casey Arntz: The last time I saw Bryan was in 2017 at one of my friend’s wedding. … And I gave him a hug and I said, “You look so good. Like I’m so proud of you.”
And both Bree and Casey say it appeared that Kohberger had a new focus — his studies in criminology.
Bree: He wanted to do something that impacted people in a good way.
Bree: People were not his strong suit. And think through his criminology studies, he was really trying to understand humans and to try and understand himself.
Now Bree, like many who knew him, struggles to connect the person they once knew to this unspeakable crime.
Bree: I think a lot of people who were close to him are feeling this massive amount of guilt … “Why didn’t I see it? Did I miss something? … Where did it go wrong?
THE YOUNG LIVES LOST
Before it was a crime scene, it was a home to five close friends. Maybe none closer than Maddie Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves.
On TikTok, the 21-year-old seniors looked like they were enjoying their final school year.
In the early morning of November 13, the two friends headed to a food truck. But their seemingly carefree existence would come to an abrupt end just hours later. Kaylee and Maddie were stabbed to death in the upstairs part of the house. A hundred miles away in northern Idaho, Kaylee’s father Steve got the news.
Peter Van Sant: Steve, give us a sense of the shock of that moment.
Steve Goncalves: You just feel like you’re getting crushed by a thousand pounds of weight.
Kaylee Goncalves/Instagram
Peter Van Sant: What do you want the world to know about your daughter, Kaylee?
Steve Goncalves: I want the world to know, they — they got robbed. Somebody stole from you.
Steve Goncalves says his daughter Kaylee would have made the world a better place. A general studies major, she was the middle child of five siblings. Goncalves says Kaylee was always up for a challenge.
Steve Goncalves: She grew up around two boys that were, you know, older than her. And uh, she didn’t see any reason why she couldn’t be as quick and fast and as good as those two boys were.
Peter Van Sant: What did she want to do with her life?
Steve Goncalves: Like most young people, it changed. She was gonna be a teacher. … But once she found out how long it was gonna take to pay back her student loans, she — she said, “Dad, you know, this thing that you do with computers seems to work pretty well.”
Maddie Mogen/Instagram
She reportedly had a job lined up in Austin but made it clear that one day she hoped to settle down somewhere near her dearest friend Maddie Mogen. Maddie was a marketing major, and she and Kaylee had been inseparable since the sixth grade.
Steve Goncalves: I just felt like it was more of a sistership than it was a friendship … And she was just one of our kids.
So, it perhaps did not come as a surprise when Steve revealed at a November memorial that Kaylee and Maddie died side-by-side.
STEVE GONCALVES (memorial service): They went to high school together. … They came here together. … And in the end, they died together. In the same room, in the same bed. It comforts us. It lets us know that they were with their best friends in the whole world.
It was a belief Maddie’s stepfather, Scott Laramie, repeated to another packed memorial just days later.
SCOTT LARAMIE (memorial service): The two of ’em were a force to be reckoned with. They stuck together through everything.
Maddie Mogen/Instagram
Maddie had a boyfriend, Jake Schriger.
JAKE SCHRIGER (memorial service): She was the first person I talked to every morning and the last person I talked to before bed.
They had been together for more than a year. Schriger says Maddie had a talent for making people laugh.
JAKE SCHRIGER (memorial service): She was really funny. Her jokes really would come outta nowhere … And just be like, “Is that the — the cute little blonde girl that just said that?”
But Maddie and Kaylee weren’t the only victims. While two other roommates were in their rooms and unharmed during the attacks, on the second floor, the killer made his way to the room of Xana Kernodle.
JAZZMIN KERNODLE (memorial service): She was my baby sister, but she was so much wiser.
Xana’s sister, Jazzmin.
JAZZMIN KERNODLE (memorial service): She would always tell me she wouldn’t know what to do without me. And now I have to live this life without her.
Molly Barkley
A 20-year-old junior majoring in marketing, Xana was known for being focused on her studies. So focused, she didn’t make much time for dating.
JAZZMIN KERNODLE (memorial service): Xana never had a boyfriend before, and my dad and I wondered if she was ever gonna get one (laughs).
That was until she met Ethan Chapin.
JAZZMIN KERNODLE (memorial service): The way she would talk and smile about him was something I’ve never seen her do before.
Ethan was a 20-year-old majoring in recreation and tourism management. Jazzmin says Xana and Ethan began dating in the spring of 2022.
JAZZMIN KERNODLE (memorial service): They had something so special and everyone around them knew.
Xana Kernodle/Instagram
Especially anyone who followed the pair on Instagram. For Ethan’s birthday, Xana posted photos of them with the caption: “Life is so much better with you in it, love you!” It would be her last Instagram post. Just two weeks later, the young couple was found stabbed to death in Xana’s bedroom.
At the University of Idaho, the pain of this tragedy is felt at the root and extends hundreds of miles away to a tulip farm in Skagit Valley, Washington. It’s where Ethan worked before heading to college. His boss, Andrew Miller.
Andrew Miller: So, Ethan started – it was in the spring of — of ’21. … It was the best Tulip Festival.
Miller says the annual tulip festival attracts close to half-a-million visitors, and Ethan stood out in the crowd.
Andrew Miller: Well, he’s a big guy wearin’ a big smile, right? I think that’s the part that I – that kinda struck me right away.
University of Idaho memorial slideshow
Ethan – a triplet – worked there with his siblings, Maizie and Hunter, and lived in a rented house on the farm with their parents. The Chapin triplets were incredibly close says Reese Gardner.
Reese Gardner: They were best friends. … If one did something, they all did something. … It was pretty cool to see.
Including attending the University of Idaho together.
Andrew Miller: And that was the funniest thing, it was like, of course it was a package deal. Like, all three of ’em were gonna go there.
Ariah Macagba: He was excited, I think, ’cause his siblings were going with him.
Ariah Macagba says Ethan’s parents had decided to live in Idaho, too. Macagba says when she heard Ethan had been murdered, she couldn’t believe it.
Ariah Macagba: I think the first thing I did was message Ethan. I was like, “Hey, you’re OK, right? Like, this isn’t real.” (crying) And — obviously, he didn’t respond.
Reese Gardner scoured the internet for information.
Reese Gardner: And I just couldn’t stop reading articles and … I just wanted to know what happened, and I wanted to know why.
But in lieu of answers, Gardner turned to tulips. He had an idea: name one after Ethan.
Reese Gardner: I thought, “There’s — there’s no better way … to remember someone who had such a big part, a big role in those farms.”
Andrew Miller: Cause Reese called me … And it was, “Hey, can this be done, and are you interested in doing it?” And I was, “Yes, and hell yes.”
But creating a new tulip is a long process, so instead, Miller suggested a mix of tulips that would be a perfect tribute to Ethan: yellow and white.
Andrew Miller: Yellow, of course, because Go Vandals. University of Idaho, right? That’s significant. And then white is — is an eternal color, right? And tulips come up in the spring. It is a symbol of — of hope.
Andrew Miller
With his parents’ blessing, they named the mix of tulips, “Ethan’s Smile.”
Andrew Miller: So, this will be a nice yellow or white tulip here in about four months.
The trio planted thousands of bulbs in the state of Washington and sent a couple thousand more to the University of Idaho.
Andrew Miller: And it really is our hope that we’ll be able to continue to plant and that anybody that wants to remember him will be able to have their own Ethan’s — Ethan’s Smile Garden. … It’s a living legacy.
Now it is up to prosecutors to get justice for these young victims.
IN SEARCH OF ANSWERS
Forty-seven days after the murders of Kaylee Goncalves, Ethan Chapin, Madison Mogen, and Xana Kernodle, authorities apprehended the man they believed was responsible. We now know investigators had Bryan Kohberger in their sights early on but kept it close to the vest. So, in the early days, after the Nov. 13 murders, frustration swept over Moscow, Idaho.
James Gagliano: I think in this instance people were expecting a pretty quick arrest in this case, and it takes time.
Kaylee Goncalves/Instagram
Steve Goncalves, father of 21-year-old Kaylee, was trying as best he could to deal with news no one expects.
Steve Goncalves: Most things I’m prepared for. Most things as a dad, you can— you can handle. But somethin’ like that, you just can’t prepare for and you can’t fix it.
Steve Goncalves: And, you know, just think if you do everything right, by the book, somethin’ like this couldn’t happen.
Peter Van Sant: Did you have any sense who might have done something like this?
Steve Goncalves: No … I didn’t think anybody in her inner circles was — was capable of interacting and — and her doing something that could even deserve something like that.
As news spread of the murders, so did shock in the college community, which had not seen a homicide since 2015.
Matt Loveless: Parents drove hundreds of miles to pick up their kids to head home and stay home for the semester.
Matt Loveless is a journalism professor at nearby Washington State University.
Matt Loveless: At this point, we don’t know if they’re gonna come back for — the spring semester there on campus. And that same thing happened in both our communities.
James Gagliano: And, so, when parents send their kids off to school, for something to happen like this, I think it’s a parent’s worst nightmare
James Gagliano is a retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent and CBS News consultant.
James Gagliano: And it’s a place, Moscow, Idaho, where violent crime really is not an issue.
As police started their investigation, they traced the victims’ final steps. The day before the murders seemed to start ordinarily. Kaylee Goncalves posted photos with her roommates and Ethan Chapin, to her Instagram account with the caption, “One lucky girl to be surrounded by these ppl everyday.” That evening, Ethan and Xana attended a party at a fraternity house on campus. Kaylee and Madison were at a bar between 10 p.m. and 1:30 a.m. They were then seen at a local food vendor, the “Grub Truck.” It is believed they all returned home by about 2 a.m. on Nov. 13.
James Gagliano: So, in examining the timeline, police know that the crime took place sometime in the early morning hours. There were also two other University of Idaho students who were inside the house when the murders took place.
AP Images
It was later that morning that a call was made to 911 from one of the surviving roommate’s phones to report an unconscious person. Police arrived at the house at 11:58 a.m.
James Gagliano: Police find the victims on the second and third floor of the house in bedrooms — a horrific and a very large-scale crime scene ’cause you’re gonna be dealing with a number of different floors that need to be processed, the bedrooms where the crimes actually occurred, and then ingress and egress points. How did the — how did the alleged killer get inside the house? Through a front door? Through a window? Those are all things police will be looking at.
CHIEF JAMES FRY (to reporters): No weapon has been located at this time. There was no sign of forced entry into the residence.
On Nov. 16, three days after the murders, the Moscow Police held their first press conference.
CHIEF JAMES FRY (to reporters): We believe this was an isolated, targeted attack on our victims. We do not have a suspect at this time and that individual is still out there.
Coroner Cathy Mabbutt issued her report on Nov. 17.
Coroner Cathy Mabbutt: They were all murdered through stabbing with some kind of a, probably a larger knife…
She told police some of the four victims had defensive wounds, but none had signs of sexual assault. Police continued to work the case, aided by the Idaho State Police and the FBI.
James Gagliano: I just believe that the Moscow Police Department probably just didn’t have a lot of experience in working a homicide, especially one as heinous as this one.
After about three weeks with no arrests, and what, to the public, appeared to be no real suspects, Steve Goncalves grew more concerned that authorities weren’t doing enough and that the murders would turn into a cold case. So, he says, he started working with his own team to investigate the murders.
Steve Goncalves: So, we just thought, “This is the time. Let’s get it out there, and let’s not let it get cold. Let’s get as many resources as— as possible.”
Peter Van Sant: And did you have any sense whatsoever as to what a motive … might have been for these murders?
Steve Goncalves: Pretty girls and a handsome guy. I thought, you know, that might be somethin’ to do with their, you know, stalking them in the sense of that.
Meanwhile, names of possible people of interest were trickling out — including members of the community and acquaintances of the victims. But they all seemed to be part of an unfounded rumor mill, many from online sleuths. Goncalves even had people come to him to prove they were not involved.
Steve Goncalves: We — had certain suspects take their shirts off in our kitchen to show if they had scratches. And we tried to do everything in — in our powers to make sure that if we thought somebody was ruled out, we truly — we truly felt like, you know, we — we looked at ’em.
CBS News
Law enforcement would end up receiving thousands of tips, but the investigation, by outward appearances, seemed to be stalled. Nearly a month after the murders, on Dec. 7, police were seen packing up the victims’ belongings to return to the families, who had lost so much. It was the police chief behind the wheel of the U-Haul truck. That same day, a plea was made to the public.
Police were interested in speaking with the occupant(s) of a white 2011-2013 Hyundai Elantra with an unknown license plate, spotted near the crime scene, around the time of the killings.
AMANDA ROLEY | KREM REPORTER: Today’s update is the first descriptive tip that we have received in several days. Detectives now want to speak with anyone who was inside a white Hyundai Elantra that was near this home on King Road around Nov. 13th.
Police released photos of similar makes to the vehicle they were looking for.
CHIEF JAMES FRY (to reporters): We still believe there is more information to be gathered.
James Gagliano: Pushing that out to the media. Pushing that out to people on the internet. Pushing that out so that people can look for either a potential suspect, person of interest, or a potential vehicle. That goes a long way towards running down leads.
INSIDE THE INVESTIGATION
It turns out that about two weeks before the police asked the public to be on the lookout for a white Hyundai Elantra, they had already shared that information with surrounding law enforcement. And on Nov. 29, 2022, a white Elantra was located by Washington State University Police. The car was registered to Bryan Kohberger.
CBS News learned, that in mid-December, the Hyundai Elantra was tracked for several days by the FBI, using E-ZPass monitoring, fixed wing aircraft and ground support, as it was driven by Kohberger, along with his father, from Pullman, Washington, on that cross-country trip to the family’s home in Pennsylvania.
On Dec. 15, the car was stopped twice in Indiana for those driving violations, by the Indiana State Police and the Hancock Sheriff’s Office.
OFFICER: So, you’re coming from Washington State University?
MICHAEL KOHBERGER: Yeah.
BRYAN KOHBERGER: Yup
OFFICER: And you’re going where?
MICHAEL KOHBERGER: We’re gonna be going to Pennsylvania.Both agencies said at the time of the stops, “there was no information available on a suspect for the crime in Idaho, to include identifying information or any specific information related to the license plate state or number of the white Hyundai Elantra …”
Police did not ticket Kohberger; they gave a verbal warning and the trip continued home. And then, Kohberger’s holiday came to an abrupt halt.
CBS NEWS REPORT: A suspect is under arrest for the quadruple murder of four Idaho college students.
Monroe County (Pa.) Correctional Facility via AP
On Dec. 30, 2022, police made that announcement that Bryan Kohberger was under arrest for the murders. He was arrested at his family’s home in Albrightsville, Pa., at 3 a.m., with approximately 50 law enforcement officers on the scene.
MAJ. CHRISTOPHER PARIS | PENNSYLVANIA STATE POLICE: There were multiple windows that were broken I believe to gain access, as well as multiple doors.
Authorities believe Bryan Kohberger acted alone.
Jason LaBar: Bryan was very shocked by his arrest. … Bryan did not know why they were there, but he was aware of the case in Idaho.
Monroe County public defender Jason LaBar represented Kohberger in Pennsylvania as he was awaiting extradition to Idaho.
Jason LaBar: Bryan indicated to me that he was eager to be exonerated — that he was willing to go back to Idaho.
On Jan. 3, at a hearing in Pennsylvania, Kohberger signed his waiver of extradition. And on Jan. 4, was flown to Idaho, where he is in jail, charged with the four murders.
Ted S. Warren / AP
On Jan. 5, Kohberger appeared in court in Moscow with his new public defender to hear the charges read against him. He has yet to enter a plea.
JUDGE MEGAN MARSHALL: The maximum penalty for this offense if you were to plead guilty or be found guilty is death or imprisonment for life. Do you understand?
BRYAN KOHBERGER: Yes.
That same day, that affidavit was released that laid out startling new details about the murder investigation. According to the affidavit, one of the surviving roommates actually saw the murderer and stood in a “frozen shock phase.” She is referred to as DM in the affidavit, and told police that earlier, she heard a female voice say, ‘something to the effect of “there’s someone here.” And later, a male voice say, “something to the effect of “it’s ok, I’m going to help you.” Later she opened her door “… after she heard crying and saw a figure clad in black clothing and a mask…” She described the figure as “5’10’… with bushy eyebrows.”
The affidavit states that, according to DM, the male walked toward the back sliding door and DM locked herself in her room. It was later in the morning when that call was made to 911 from one of the surviving roommate’s phones, to report an unconscious person. It is unclear what occurred in the hours before police were called. It is believed the murders took place between 4 and 4:25 a.m. Police say they discovered, on the bed in Madison’s room, a knife sheath with a Marine insignia.
James Gagliano: I would imagine that a — crime scene as — as grisly and ghastly as this one — that there would have been … DNA left by the perpetrator.
James Keivom
According to the affidavit, the knife sheath was processed and “the Idaho State Lab later located a single source of male DNA on the button snap.” They were able to link it to DNA recovered from the trash at the Pennsylvania Kohberger family home.
It is not clear, what, if any, connection Kohberger had with the victims. However, the affidavit states that by using cellular phone data, police were able to place Kohberger’s cell phone near the crime scene “on at least twelve occasions before November 13, 2022. All of those occasions, except for one, occurred in the late evening and early morning hours …”
Even with these new details, many question remain. A newly issued gag order prohibits officials and others involved in the case from speaking about the murders. Also, authorities have sealed a search warrant that was carried out at Kohberger’s home in Pullman, Washington.
Jim Gagliano: This is one where you don’t want a mistake. You don’t want something to happen during this process that’s going to give the alleged suspect an opportunity to beat the case.
Now, the case will work its way through the court system as parents, who lost their children, will be looking for answers.
Steve Goncalves: We find the truth, you know. You get the truth, and then that — that’ll — that’ll be everything.
IN REMEMBRANCE
You can see it in the stunned, silent faces of the kids. Faces that ask “why?” without even speaking.
Alamy
Young eyes glisten, bathed in the glow of candlelight at a vigil held for the young lives lost. A ritual all too familiar across America. The flowers, the prayers, the vows to carry on. In Idaho, they hold on tight to each other and to the memories of those loved and lost.
EMILY (memorial service): Life is so unfair and unpredictable (crying).
For Xana Kernodle’s friend Emily, the wound remains raw.
EMILY (memorial service): And it tears me apart knowing I can’t hug her. (Crying) So hold those you love closer. Hug them a little tighter and tell ’em you love them. We’ll find justice for you, Ethan, Maddie, and Kaylee. We love you all so much.
And for Ashlin, Maddie Mogen’s memory is still vibrant.
ASHLIN (memorial service): You truly will live on forever — not only in my heart, but in the heart of so many people that were impacted by your beautiful smile, your grace, your patience, your open heart, and your craziness.
Kaylee Goncalves/Instagram
Hunter Johnson remembers a pal he could rely on — Ethan Chapin.
HUNTER JOHNSON (memorial service): Ethan was always someone you could count on to make you smile and — cheer up your mood. … And I — feel so lucky to have shared so many great memories with him (emotional).
But those who are older perhaps sense that pain that runs this deep, never goes away. Kaylee’s father, Steve Goncalves.
Steve Goncalves: You don’t heal from somethin’ like this. … it’s never gonna happen. You’re never gonna be healed. You’re never gonna get through this. And when they die, part of you dies.
Steve Goncalves: We’re tired of all these types of crimes. We’re tired of all this stuff. And — we can rally around these terrible tragedies, and … We’re hopin’ that as a society we come back stronger. And we — we decide to not let this be accepted anymore, you know. That’s what I hope for.
Bryan Kohberger’s next court appearance is scheduled for Jan. 12.
He will have a chance to enter a plea at a later date.
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Has the anonymous author of the infamous Circleville letters been unmasked?
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This story previously aired on August 6, 2022.
For nearly two decades, an anonymous letter writer terrorized the town of Circleville, Ohio, by sending threatening letters that exposed alleged secrets about neighbors and friends. The mystery has long intrigued TV shows, podcasters and now “48 Hours” in the quest to finally unmask the writer.
MARIE MAYHEW [“Whatever Remains” podcast]: Something pretty disturbing happened in Circleville, starting small and flourishing over decades. … Residents … began to receive letters that accused the citizens of being involved in some pretty terrible things — embezzlement, domestic violence, affairs, and even murder.
Marie Mayhew: The Circleville letter writer … knew everything about everyone … and knew everyone’s secrets.
Robin Yocum: They were vicious and … ugly. Someone with severe psychological problems, I would hazard to guess.
The threatening, anonymous letters kept coming — hundreds of them. Most were postmarked from Columbus, Ohio, about 30 miles north, which is where “48 Hours” correspondent Erin Moriarty grew up and was living in March 1977 — when small town Circleville began to feel under siege. When just a walk to the mailbox could trigger terror, especially for one woman who lived there, a school bus driver by the name of Mary Gillispie.
Marie Mayhew: Mary Gillispie goes out to her mailbox. She receives a letter. … She opens it. It’s an anonymous letter … distinct handwriting, and it’s telling her to end the affair … with the superintendent of the school there, Gordon Massie:
ERIN MORIARTY [reading a letter]: “Mrs. Gillispie, stay away from Massie. I’ve been observing your house and I know you have children.”
ROBIN YOCUM [reading a letter] It’s your daughters turn to pay for what you’ve done. … I shall come out there and put a bullet in that little girl’s head.”
Robin Yocum: These letters were being sent to newspapers, elected officials, private citizens.
Marie Mayhew: And they’re all saying the same thing, that basically Gordon Massie, the superintendent … he needs to be exposed. He needs to be fired.
Marie Mayhew: Her husband, Ron Gillispie, begins to receive them as well.
MARIE MAYHEW [reading a letter]: “Mr. Gillispie, your wife is seeing Gordon Massie. … You should catch them together and kill them both. … He doesn’t deserve to live.”
Janet Cassady: Well, he got letters saying that if he didn’t do something about this affair, his life would be in danger.
MARIE MAYHEW [reading a letter]: “We know what kind of car you drive … We know where your kids go to school …”
MARIE MAYHEW [podcast]: By August of 1977, everything changes when Ron Gillispie gets a call late one night. Enraged, he picks up a gun, gets in his truck … and drives off.
Martin Yant: And told the … daughter that he … was going to confront the letter writer.
Martin Yant: He was traveling at a high speed … lost control of the truck … went off the road, hit a tree … and was killed.
Martin Yant: The letter writer had made threats to … Ron Gillispie that …. he could end up dead. And then he ended up dead.
MARIE MAYHEW [podcast]: Was Ron Gillispie’s death an accident or was he murdered?
Pam Stanton: Murdered.
Erin Moriarty: This case has really left its mark.
Pam Stanton: Yeah, it has destroyed a lot of people.
June Whitehead: I think there was a big cover-up.
Martin Yant: Turned out to be quite a mystery.
Four decades later, the debate over the writer’s identity continues. Could a forensic document expert have the answer?
Erin Moriarty: Do you think you know who wrote those anonymous letters?
Beverley East | Forensic document expert: Yes, I do.
A MYSTERY BEGINS
Circleville, Ohio, has the look and feel of a quaint Midwestern town.
Martin Yant: In many ways it’s sort of an all-American town. … Still has a pretty rural character to it. … And some families have been there for decades.
Its major attraction, says journalist Martin Yant, is the annual Pumpkin Show.
Janet Cassady: Well, it was a good place to live. … fairly peaceful ’til all this stuff started [laughs].
Janet Cassady is talking about that barrage of anonymous poison pen letters that began arriving in mailboxes all over Circleville in 1977.
MARIE MAYHEW [reading from podcast]: “Small towns have big secrets buried deep under those freshly mowed lawns …”
It caught the attention of Marie Mayhew, who researched the story for her podcast “Whatever Remains.”
MARIE MAYHEW [reading from podcast]: “This anonymous author was hell-bent to expose every ugly little secret in Circleville.”
At first, the writer seemed fixated on the married school district superintendent and his rumored relationship with the school bus driver.
Jackson Middle School yearbook
Marie Mayhew: Gordon Massie … was a well-thought-of man in Circleville.
Marie Mayhew: Mary Gillispie was a wife and a mother … they were accusing her of adultery.
Erin Moriarty: You’ve got the superintendent possibly having an affair with a school bus driver? Wasn’t that kind of the talk of town?
June Whitehead: Yeah, it was, definitely.
June Whitehead grew up in Pickaway County with her sister Janet.
Janet Cassady [referencing a yearbook photo of Mary]: Have you seen Mary’s picture? … She was Miss Jackson.
Erin Moriarty: She looks really attractive there.Janet Cassady: She was.
Mary married her high school sweetheart Ron Gillispie.
Janet Cassady: And you wouldn’t find a better person than Ronnie Gillispie.
The couple had two children and settled in Circleville.
Erin Moriarty: I mean, this had to be very awkward … for Mary Gillispie, her children … for Gordon Massie, for his wife, for his son …
Marie Mayhew: It must have been awful … I mean it was just sort of this all-invasive poison. … there was nobody that was off limits to this letter writer.
And it wasn’t just a campaign of letters. There were phone calls and offensive signs that began appearing along Mary’s bus route.
Marie Mayhew: Ron would have to go out and … he would have to find and pick up all the signage about his wife and kids around Circleville.
Determined to stop the writer, the Gillispies brought their letters to the sheriff’s office.
Marie Mayhew: There was an ongoing investigation. … They were tapping phones. They were watching houses. … They tried to work with the USPS to … check the mail.
But the letters continued, and small-town Circleville was consumed with speculation. Was the writer male or female? Did the writer live in town?
Then in August 1977, Mary left her husband and children at home and drove to Florida with her sister-in-law.
Marie Mayhew: Ron had told her he knew who the letter writer was and he was going to take care of this problem while they were in Florida.
They were en route when they learned Ron had crashed his truck into a tree after getting that mysterious phone call. The coroner ruled his death an accident, but Ron’s brother-in-law, Paul Freshour, believed he’d been murdered.
Pickaway County Sheriff’s Office/Ohio BCI
Martin Yant: Although a number of people told me that he was not a heavy drinker, he had almost twice the legal limit of alcohol in his blood.
Also suspicious, under Ron’s body, police found a .22 caliber revolver.
Martin Yant: The gun had been fired once. So, then the question was, was he shooting at the letter writer? … The sheriff didn’t give that any credence at all.
But Paul Freshour kept pushing the Pickaway County sheriff to take a closer look. Pam Stanton was close to the Freshours.
Pam Stanton: He wanted the truth about Ron’s death. He wanted to know who was writing the letters too.
The attacks on Mary Gillispie and Gordon Massie didn’t stop. Now, letters were also being sent to local businesses, government offices, schools and people who lived in the area.
Martin Yant: This person was, at that point, pretty unbound, not afraid to say anything. … And it scared a lot of people … you know, is he coming after me or is she coming after me?
Mary had always denied having an affair with Massie, but after Ron’s death, she says, they began seeing each other. That’s when the threats against her became even more vicious.
Pickaway County Sheriff’s Office/Pickaway County Courthouse
ROBIN YOCUM [reading a letter]: “Everyone knows what you have done. If you don’t believe us, just make them mad and find out for yourself.”
Robin Yocum writes mysteries, but back in the early 1980’s he was a crime reporter for The Columbus Dispatch.
Robin Yocum: There were obscenities and threats … to do harm to Mrs. Gillispie’s daughter.
ROBIN YOCUM [reading a letter]: “It’s your daughters turn to pay for what you’ve done …
On February 7, 1983, at 3:30 p.m., Mary Gillispie was driving her empty school bus, heading to pick up kids.
She was about to turn left on Five Points Pike, when she looked over and saw a handmade sign on a fence. It talked about her 13-year-old daughter and it was obscene. She pulled the bus over. But when she tried to pull the sign off the fence, she realized it was rigged with twine and a box. She says she took that box home; she then opened it and got a shocking surprise.Marie Mayhew: It was a gun, and it was ready to go off.
When Mary brought the box to the sheriff’s office, investigators quickly realized it was a booby trap. Yocum was in the newsroom when word got out.
Robin Yocum: And I remember the excitement … From a newspaper perspective, it’s a great story — a woman who had been the target of all these letters finds a booby trap with a .25 caliber handgun rigged to it. … All reporters would want to cover that story.
Especially if there was a dramatic twist.
EVIDENCE AND THEORIES
MARIE MAYHEW [reading from podcast]: “There’s small town intrigue, a seemingly omnipresent unknown villain extracting revenge on the people of Circleville by uncovering their secrets, a mysterious death, an elaborate attempted murder …”
To this day, there’s a fierce debate about who that villain is — or was. So, we’ll take you back through the evidence and theories and you can decide.
Erin Moriarty: This sounds like something out of an Agatha Christie novel, doesn’t it?
Marie Mayhew: It does. … there’s a cast of characters … the letters would keep coming. … And then … the inevitable attempted murder. But it is very much an Agatha Christie feel to it.
Pickaway County Sheriff’s Office/ Ohio BCI
And just like one of Christie’s mysteries, the gun found in the booby trap provided the first clue. Firearm examiners at BCI — Ohio’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation — were able to restore the partially filed off serial number.
Martin Yant: And when they traced the gun, it came to a co-worker of Paul’s … And he said, “yeah, I sold that to Paul Freshour.”
On the surface, says Martin Yant, it was shocking because Paul Freshour and his wife, Karen Sue, had been close to Mary Gillispie and her late husband Ron — Karen Sue’s brother.
Martin Yant: It was kind of an extended family that seemed to socialize together.
But by 1983, when sheriff’s investigators went to talk to Karen Sue, the Freshour’s were in the midst of a contentious divorce.
Martin Yant: Karen Sue gave them quite an earful.
She told investigators Paul had become infuriated with Mary.
MARIE MAYHEW [reading from podcast]: “Karen said Paul had thought the world of Ron and Mary before Ron died. But after his death Paul hated Mary — hated her over the ‘Massie deal’.”
And then Karen Sue told them that her estranged husband was behind Circleville’s anonymous letters.
Martin Yant: She had found one letter torn up in a commode. And she had found a couple of other letters hidden in the house.
When investigators went to see Paul Freshour, Marie Mayhew says, he was very cooperative.
Erin Moriarty: Did he demand to have a lawyer?
Marie Mayhew: No. … he answered all of their questions.
And readily admitted the gun belonged to him.
Martin Yant: Well, they ask him … how the gun ended up in the booby trap. … and he said, “I don’t know.”
Freshour told investigators his gun had been stolen weeks earlier and allowed them to search his house and his car. He even gave them samples of his handwriting.
Marie Mayhew: It definitely does seem like he has absolutely nothing to hide at that point.
He denied being the letter writer and said he had nothing to do with the booby trap. But he failed a polygraph. So, Paul Freshour was arrested for the attempted murder of Mary Gillispie.
Erin Moriarty: Were you surprised when he was charged with attempted murder?
Pam Stanton: Yes. Yes. Yeah, I was.
This was the man Pam Stanton called “Uncle Paul,” and says their families were so close she thought of him as a second father.
Pam Stanton: I mean, was he worried … His life was on the line, his freedom … Yeah, he was scared. Anybody would be.
Freshour was never charged with sending any of the threatening, harassing letters. But, in Circleville, there was an assumption that the letter writer was finally behind bars.
On October 24, 1983, Paul Freshour went on trial at the Pickaway County Courthouse in Circleville.
Robin Yocum: It was a big deal.
Robin Yocum didn’t cover the trial, but he followed all the news coverage.
Robin Yocum: You know, he was the mastermind behind this alleged booby trap. … but almost everything focused on the letters.
First up was the intended victim: Mary Gillispie. She testified about finding the booby trap and then, over the defense objections, she was asked about the anonymous letters she had received.
Erin Moriarty: How damaging was that to Paul Freshour at his trial?
Marie Mayhew: That was very, very damaging.
The defense argued there was no direct threat to Mary’s life and the letters, so they weren’t relevant to the case but the judge allowed in 39 of them.
It was a break for the prosecution, which claimed the writing on the booby trap shared similarities to those letters.
Marie Mayhew: The letter and the writing that was on the 2×4 … was the same block handwriting, sort of the same cadence and the same message as the anonymous letter writer.
The state brought in the BCI handwriting analyst who compared the writing on the booby trap to the letters sent to Mary and then to samples of Paul Freshour’s handwriting.
Martin Yant: They had handwriting analyses that indicated that the letters could have been written by Paul Freshour.
And a second expert — originally a defense witness — agreed.Erin Moriarty: I mean, that’s pretty damaging, isn’t it, when a witness hired by the defense ends up testifying for the prosecution?
Marie Mayhew: I can only imagine it was something you’d want to avoid [laughs].
It was far more difficult for the prosecution to prove Freshour made the booby trap.
Erin Moriarty: Was Paul Freshour’s fingerprints found on the gun or the box that held the gun?
Martin Yant: No. … and they didn’t have a whole lot of evidence about the booby trap other than he admitted that was his gun.
There was circumstantial evidence. Freshour had taken the day off from work the same day the booby trap was found. And that box that held the gun — an industrial sized chalk box — was easily found at Anheuser Busch where Paul worked.
Martin Yant: They had his gun and the booby trap, and they had the chalk box … So, they thought they had plenty of evidence.
But no one saw Freshour near the booby trap.
Martin Yant: He had a pretty good alibi for most of the day.
Paul Freshour didn’t take the stand, but multiple defense witnesses testified to seeing him at home. He was having work done on his house. The reason, he said, he took that day off.
Robin Yocum: As the trial progressed … I’m thinking a lot of this stuff just doesn’t add up. You know, where are the fingerprints? … Where’s the physical evidence?
Craig Holman/USA Today Network
But it was enough evidence for the jurors. They found Paul Freshour guilty of attempted murder.
Erin Moriarty How did you hear the verdict? [Pan Stanton cries] Even after all this time, it’s still hard, isn’t it?
Pam Stanton [crying]: I got home, and everybody was just a basket case. They were crying. Everybody was upset.
He received the maximum sentence: 7 to 25 years in prison.
Erin Moriarty: When Paul Freshour was convicted, did everybody in town breathe a sigh of relief? The letter writer is caught. It’s over.
Robin Yocum: I think that’s a fair assessment. … they’ve linked him to the letters, they linked him to the booby trap. We’re going to get this guy out of our community, get him in prison … Everything will kind of go back to normal, except it didn’t because the letters never stopped.
QUESTIONS REMAIN
Robin Yocum: Paul was living a pretty good life. … had never had any problems with the law … basically, he lost everything. … lost his home, lost his job, went to prison.
It was inconceivable to Paul Freshour’s family and friends that the man they so admired could be convicted of attempted murder.
Pam Stanton: It’s just preposterous. … there’s no way.
Janet Cassady: He wasn’t dumb enough to put his own gun in a booby trap [laughs]. Anybody could have gotten that gun.
Even today, former investigative journalists Martin Yant and Robin Yocum question whether Freshour’s verdict was fair.
Robin Yocum: Can I tell you I’m 100% sure that he didn’t do it? No, I can’t. … But I can tell you … had I been sitting on that jury I would have never sent a guy to prison based on that flimsy evidence.
Martin Yant: The more I got involved in the case and … the more I saw, there were just too many question marks.
At trial, the prosecution had branded Paul Freshour the Circleville letter writer. But once he was locked up, how did menacing anonymous letters keep coming?
Robin Yocum: I’m not talking about one or two letters … there were hundreds of letters that went out after he was in prison.
The Pickaway County sheriff couldn’t say how Freshour was able to write and send those letters, but he was certain Paul was responsible. The prison warden disagreed.
Martin Yant: His warden insisted that would be impossible. They kept him in isolation. They did not allow him to have pens or paper.
Robin Yocum: He was strip searched … All his incoming and outgoing mail was inspected. … There is absolutely, positively no way Paul Freshour was writing those letters and smuggling them out from prison. No way.
After Yocum and Yant wrote articles about Paul Freshour, they also received letters. And, inexplicably, so did Paul Freshour while behind bars.
Pickaway County Sheriff’s Office/Marie Mayhew
Martin Yant: The letter writer bragged about setting him up. … He said, “when we set him up, we set him up good.”
Erin Moriarty: And who did Paul think had set him up?Martin Yant: Karen Sue.
Erin Moriarty: His ex-wife.
Martin Yant: His ex-wife.
Paul Freshour’s lawyer raised that very possibility during his closing argument: “Who hated Paul enough to try to get him into trouble … if you read the divorce decree, who stands to profit financially, if Paul is convicted goes to prison.”
Pam Stanton says, during that divorce battle, Karen Sue lost her home, custody of their daughters, and was living in a trailer on Mary Gillispie’s property.
Pam Stanton: If Uncle Paul was out of the picture, she got it all.
And Karen Sue was one of the first to link Paul to the anonymous letters. Remember, she told investigators she found some at their home, including that one in the commode.
MARIE MAYHEW [podcast]: Karen tried to piece it back together when Paul was not at home and said she could make the name of Gillispie out on the letter.
Erin Moriarty: Could she show them these letters?
Martin Yant: No. … she didn’t keep the letters.
Erin Moriarty: Does that make sense?
Martin Yant: Not to me … why wouldn’t she run off right away to the sheriff’s office and say, look, this is from my husband. He’s the letter writer. … she didn’t do any of that until after the booby trap was found.
Erin Moriarty: Do you believe that Paul Freshour did set up the booby trap and tried to kill Mary Gillispie?
Martin Yant: No, I don’t. I think somebody stole his gun to set him up, and it worked.
In the early 1990s, when Martin Yant began investigating Freshour’s case, he discovered evidence in police reports of an alternate suspect.
Martin Yant: There was another bus driver … who saw what I think is very significant. …. It was something that never came up at trial and it points in a whole different direction.
Investigators never followed up, but Yant did. The female bus driver told him that 20 minutes before Mary found the booby trap, she had driven by the same spot.
Martin Yant: She said … she saw a man standing beside an … El Camino … But the man turned away from her and acted like he was going to the bathroom … So, she didn’t get a good look at him.
The description didn’t seem to match Paul Freshour.
Martin Yant: She said he was a large man with sandy hair. And Paul was not large, and he had very dark hair.
Erin Moriarty: And wasn’t Karen Sue at that point dating a man who was large with sandy hair?
Martin Yant: Yes.
And what about the El Camino?
Martin Yant: There’s no evidence that any inquiries were made about who might have an El Camino.
Erin Moriarty: Didn’t in fact … Karen Sue’s brother have an El Camino?
Martin Yant: That’s what I’ve been told.
But Marie Mayhew believes trying to connect the booby trap to Karen Sue is tenuous at best.
Marie Mayhew: There’s someone who looked like the man she was dating driving a car that looked like it could have been her brother’s…. none of that points back to Karen Sue.
Marie Mayhew: I don’t believe that she framed her husband for this or was responsible for it.
Ten years after Paul Freshour went to prison, the intrigue surrounding the case caught the attention of the television series “Unsolved Mysteries.” But in December 1993, before filming even began, the show received a postcard with an ominous threat.
MARTIN YANT: [reading postcard] “Forget Circleville, Ohio. … If you come to Ohio, you el sickos will pay. The Circleville writer.”
It didn’t deter the show from going to Circleville. Even Paul Freshour, who had just been released on parole, agreed to talk.
PAUL FRESHOUR [“Unsolved Mysteries” interview]: I’d really like to see someone really look at this case, on the letters. Reopen the letter part of it and get in and find out who wrote the letters.
Pam Stanton says Karen Sue was not happy “Unsolved Mysteries” was in town, or that Stanton agreed to be interviewed.
Pam Stanton: I got a phone call and her telling me it would be in my best interest not to go.
Karen Sue didn’t participate in the program, but according to Stanton, she kept track of everyone who did.
Pam Stanton: She sat in a car on the other side of the intersection and took pictures of everybody going in and out for the interviews.
If true, Marie Mayhew says that doesn’t prove anything. What’s more, Karen Sue has never been considered a suspect by police.
Marie Mayhew: I think she’s a very convenient villain.
“48 Hours” reached out to her, but she did not respond to our requests for an interview.
Martin Yant: There are so many twists and turns in this case … all-of-a-sudden something … will surface and makes you rethink what you were thinking.
Martin Yant is right. And there’s another twist to come.
A NEW TWIST IN THE CASE
It took nearly 20 years, but in 1994 the Circleville letters abruptly stopped when Paul Freshour was released from prison.
Erin Moriarty: Did people when he got out still think he was the letter writer?
Pam Stanton: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Martin Yant: He was very hurt. And he was hurt with what it did to his family.
A very uncivil war had been raging for years between Paul Freshour and his ex-wife, Karen Sue. Even their two daughters were divided over their dad. And caught in the middle was their son, Mark.
Pam Stanton: He was so loyal to his mom. … But he loved his dad, too. But with Sue … you were going to be her son or his son.
Pam Stanton says Mark chose his mom, and never once visited his father in prison.
Pam Stanton: He wouldn’t tell me why. He just said he couldn’t.
It was Paul Freshour’s gun discovered in the booby trap that helped land him behind bars.
According to Martin Yant, Freshour strongly suspected that the thief was his own son.
Martin Yant: He did tell some people that the gun had been stolen. And I did interview one man that said he specifically told him that he thought it was Mark, the son.
Erin Moriarty: And this was before there was any talk of a booby trap?
Martin Yant: Before the booby trap.
Freshour kept his suspicions about his son to himself, says Yant.
Martin Yant: Family loyalty meant more to him, even though his son had totally rejected him.
Erin Moriarty: Why didn’t he … point the finger at his son?
Pam Stanton: Paul … get his son in trouble? No, Uncle Paul would’ve never done that.
Erin Moriarty: But he knew he could go to prison.
Pam Stanton: No, I don’t care. … Uncle Paul would have died before he had seen Mark go to jail.
Pam Stanton: All this destroyed Mark. … The divorce, the letters … it all destroyed him in a way that can never be fixed.
Just before sunrise on September 11, 2002, in Portsmouth, Ohio, a man’s body was found floating in the Scioto River. It was 39-year-old Mark Freshour. He had shot himself. His mother, Karen Sue, later told police her son had suffered for years from depression.
Pam Stanton: And I firmly believe when Mark took his life, he could not deal with the guilt any longer.
If Paul Freshour actually had nothing to do with the booby trap, is it also possible he had nothing to do with the letters?
Robin Yocum: As he told me …”I didn’t write the letters. … I didn’t do this.”
Martin Yant: Even after he got out of prison, he approached the FBI and asked them to … investigate the case.
The FBI never responded, says Yant. But nearly three decades later, one of its former star profilers agreed to examine the Circleville letters for “48 Hours.” Mary Ellen O’Toole has explored some of the darkest criminal minds from the Green River Killer to the Unabomber.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: Whoever the writer is, they’re flying under the radar screen …coming across as very normal … and people would not suspect them.
Pickaway County Courthouse
Who was the Circleville writer? Or were there multiple writers? O’Toole believes one solitary author churned out every letter.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: When you have one person and one person only … that person can take the secret to the grave.
Erin Moriarty: Do you think it’s male or female? Can you tell?
Mary Ellen O’Toole: All right [laughs]. I knew that would be one of your first questions. … When it comes to the letter writer, gender is very difficult to discern.
That’s because the writer was clever, consistently deceptive, and manipulative, says O’Toole.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: You see the manipulation continue throughout these letters.
She went all the way back to the writer’s first letters in 1977, hunting for hints about gender and found some.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: The letter writer kept referring to, “I’m the boyfriend of a woman.” … They wanted to make you believe, “I’m not a woman, I’m a man.”
Mary Ellen O’Toole: And seeing … how they were trying to hide who they were makes me think there could be a … good possibility, it’s a female.
Altogether, O’Toole inspected 98 letters, finding the word choices and the grammar revealing.
Erin Moriarty: How educated is this writer? Can you tell?
Mary Ellen O’Toole: I would say this is not a highly educated person. … because of the quality of the sentences and how they were put together.
Significant, says O’Toole, considering that Paul Freshour had a job as a manager at Anheuser Busch and a master’s degree. She says there were other identifying clues from the anonymous writer.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: As you read these letters, you can see the letter writer is really havin’ a good time.
Erin Moriarty: What does that say about that person?
Mary Ellen O’Toole: The letter writer is pretty callous. … This person … would have to know, “I’m hurting people and that’s OK with me.”
A sign the writer might have been suffering from a personality disorder, says O’Toole, meaning that he or she knew the difference between right and wrong, but simply chose “wrong.”
Mary Ellen O’Toole: So, that would suggest to me that in their regular everyday life, they sought ways to be a bully … to be intimidating.
If that’s the case, Pam Stanton says that does not sound like her Uncle Paul.
Erin Moriarty Did he have like a dark side to him or anything?
Pam Stanton: Never. Uncle Paul was never bitter, never angry.
Erin Moriarty: Do you think the letter writer was Paul Freshour?
Mary Ellen O’Toole: Right now, I have my doubts.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: Sitting here today, I’d say I can’t rule him out. But I’m … looking at other reasons that tell me … it might in fact be somebody different.
And O’Toole does not believe the secretive writer would risk exposure by setting a booby trap in a public place.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: That suggests to me that may have been done by somebody else who took advantage of the situation.
The mystery seemed to only deepen. But one expert is convinced she does know the identity of the Circleville writer.
Beverley East: 100% sure.
THE LETTER WRITER REVEALED?
When the 1980 Robert Redford prison drama “Brubaker” needed extras in the Columbus area, Paul Freshour channeled experience as a former prison guard to play one on the big screen. Little did he know he’d eventually serve a decade for attempted murder. And although never charged with terrorizing Circleville with the letters, he had to live with people believing he was the writer. But not sisters, Janet Cassady and June Whitehead.
Erin Moriarty: What is one thing that you really want to see corrected?
June Whitehead: I don’t think Paul’s guilty. I think he served those 10 years in prison, and I don’t think he was guilty of the attempted murder. And I don’t really think he was the letter writer.
And with former FBI profiler Mary Ellen O’Toole believing the writer could be someone other than Paul Freshour, it calls into question the testimony of those two handwriting experts at his trial linking him to the letters. So, “48 Hours” turned to forensic document expert Beverley East, looking for her independent analysis.
Beverley East: I don’t wanna hear the story ’cause … the documents tell me the story.
That story, says East, begins by identifying distinct writing patterns in Paul Freshour’s known writing. In this case, letters he wrote to a friend.
CBS News
Beverley East: The “G” in Grimer is a very unusual G. Looks like a six, a number 6.
Erin Moriarty: And that’s unusual?
Beverley East: That’s very unusual.
She then studied a selection of 49 of the anonymous letters — spanning from when they first started in 1977 through the 1990s — and found that unusual “G” shaped like a number 6 in several of the Circleville letters, including one sent while Paul Freshour was in prison.
Beverley East: So Gillispie, Gillispie, gettin’, Gillispie, and Gordon, you’ve got that number 6.
East says numbers can tell a story of their own, pointing to this zip code written by Paul … there’s an ambiguous number “3” that might also be a “2.”
Beverley East: Numbers don’t lie. Numbers don’t lie.
Beverley East: It’s like he’s not sure if it’s 4-2-1-1 2 or 4-3-1-1-3. …In the anonymous letters on the zip code …I found the same mistake.
While East admits there are writing patterns in the anonymous letters that don’t look like Paul Freshour’s, after showing “48 Hours” almost 100 examples of his distinct quirks that she was able to identify, she is convinced one person was responsible.
Beverley East: I would go into court and swear on the Bible on the evidence that I found.
Erin Moriarty: And when you say you’d swear on the Bible, what would you say?
Beverley East: I would say one person wrote all of these. And the one person is this person.
Erin Moriarty: Paul Freshour.
Beverley East: Paul Freshour.
Erin Moriarty: And if you saw that a document examiner today thought, in fact, he did write those letters, would that change your mind?
Pam Stanton: No.
And there is a historical basis for skepticism.
Erin Moriarty: You know that some document examiners have been wrong in the past.
Beverley East: I cannot … speak for others … there are always gonna be times where people are inaccurate. And it’s not because the science is not accurate. It’s because … that particular examiner has not done due diligence to arrive at the opinion that they should do.
Beverley East: You can’t be wrong [laughs]. You — ’cause … somebody’s life and livelihood is at the end of your opinion. So, I am not wrong.
While studying the thousands of pages of the case file, Marie Mayhew made a discovery that supports East’s findings. Investigators had found Paul Freshour’s fingerprints on about a dozen letters postmarked while he was incarcerated.
Marie Mayhew: Those fingerprints are there and they’re his.
Erin Moriarty: Do you think that Paul Freshour is the Circleville letter writer?
Marie Mayhew: Yes, I honestly do.
Former FBI profiler Mary Ellen O’Toole says she cannot explain those letters. But she also cannot ignore that during Freshour’s decade in prison, the phantom writer mailed hundreds of letters.
Mary Ellen O’Toole: If a crime continues on and you have someone … in custody for a long period of time … you have to say, “Somebody else is sending these letters. … they’re not happening by magic. Somebody else is writing the letters.”
Erin Moriarty: If in fact Paul Freshour was the letter writer, is it possible that he mass-produced letters, went to prison, and then had somebody else send them while he was in?
Mary Ellen O’Toole: Anything is possible. … That would have to be investigated and ruled out.
Paul Freshour died June 28, 2012, at age 70, still fighting to prove his innocence. Instead, what’s left behind is an unfinished portrait. Was Paul Freshour the successful, loving family man he appeared to be? Or was he a cruel, even dangerous, criminal mastermind?
Whatever your conclusion, Paul Freshour predicted — when interviewed by writer Robin Yocum 36 years ago — that his notoriety as the Circleville letter writer would long outlive him.
ROBIN YOCUM [Reading]: “When I’m dead and in my grave, people are going to believe I’m sending those letters.” Unfortunately, Paul died. … and we’ll never know. We’ll never know.
No one has ever been charged with writing the Circleville letters, but the Pickaway County Sheriff’s office says the case is closed.
Produced by Lisa Freed and Richard Fetzer. Mead Stone is the producer-editor. David Dow and Tamara Weitzman are the development producers. Jud Johnston, Ken Blum and Diana Modica are the editors. Lourdes Aguiar is the senior producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer.
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The Circleville Letters
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Chasing Catherine Shelton (Part 2)
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