CA CA - Bob Harrod, 81, Orange County, 27 July 2009 - #17

[zwiebel]

That other Placentia cold case has been resolved everyone. Raymundo Gutierrez Pereda was found guilty of murder Friday. No sentence yet but it will be 25 years to life. As he's about 73 now, I guess it's safe to say he will spend the rest of his life in prison, whatever's decided.

http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2013/11/iftekhar_murtaza_raymundo_guti.php

For anyone who doesn't know, this murder took place in Bob's street, and his daughter JuM and son in law moved into the house afterwards. Another daughter's said how JuM talked about fingerprint dust etc, and other crime scene stuff still being around. It may be true, although I can't help thinking JuM may have a tendency to embellish stories sometimes.

 

[zwiebel]

Lynsie Ekelund, Placentia - Cold Case solved.

Mary Ann O'Neill, Placentia - Cold Case solved.

Bob Harrod, Placentia -

Two down. One to go.

 

[Grainne Dhu]

That other Placentia cold case has been resolved everyone. Raymundo Gutierrez Pereda was found guilty of murder Friday. No sentence yet but it will be 25 years to life. As he's about 73 now, I guess it's safe to say he will spend the rest of his life in prison, whatever's decided.

http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2013/11/iftekhar_murtaza_raymundo_guti.php

For anyone who doesn't know, this murder took place in Bob's street, and his daughter JuM and son in law moved into the house afterwards. Another daughter's said how JuM talked about fingerprint dust etc, and other crime scene stuff still being around. It may be true, although I can't help thinking JuM may have a tendency to embellish stories sometimes.

At least about the fingerprint powder, she may have been telling the truth. I don't know what it is made of but it is black, extremely fine and sticks tenaciously to anything it touches. Being fine, it also floats on the slightest air current, so it can drift for quite a way before it finally sticks to something. The house may not have been still covered in it but I bet they were still finding it in little cracks and nooks and crannies.

Houses are usually a wreck after forensic processing. The former owner may have just given up on getting it professionally restored and sold it as is for a (usually hefty) discount. For someone able and willing to do the work, it means they can buy a lot more house or a house in a better neighbourhood than they could otherwise afford.

If that were the case then there is one drawback: banks are very hesitant to give out mortgages for houses like that because they know that people tend to run out of steam on their DIY projects. So either the Ms had a proven history of successfully completing fixer-uppers or they had an alternative source of financing.

 

[Grainne Dhu]

Lol sres, you should check out Bob's website sometime!

I would LOVE to know what Corrie sounded like to listen to in life - I've just heard video recordings. I'm terribly impressed by her bravery of course, in the Netherlands at a time when to speak out for victims - let alone help them - meant stepping outside the bounds of normal society and personal safety.

I am completely in awe of of what she did after the war though. Amongst all of it, that she shook hands with one of the worst guards in her concentration camp and forgave him, left me dumbfounded. He'd gone to hear her speak like you. This was the same camp her sister died in. I'm not made of such stuff and couldn't have done it, but she really was a lady who practised what she preached.

I think Corrie headed to CA to help spread the word more via film, but I haven't seen anything about why she specifically chose Placentia. Maybe because the houses there are just about the polar opposite of Dutch ones, with their endless, endless stairs?

(They are lovely houses, but I've learned to specify I can't cope with more than six flights if I book a guesthouse!)

Placentia really is honored to have her in its history, and should be very proud.

Finding out that Corrie Ten Boom lived in Placentia in the last part of her life made me feel a tiny bit better about Bob, oddly enough.

If there is a Christian heaven, then wouldn't it be lovely to be greeted there by someone like Corrie? I imagine Bob arriving feeling confused and frightened after whatever happened and being greeted by this great lady with her incredible capacity for love. Who wouldn't feel soothed by her presence?

 

[zwiebel]

What a lovely thought Grainne.

 

[zwiebel]

The OC DA's office is chasing another cold case too. They have been busy. This is from 1995 in Santa Ana though. I know it's OC DA's office they're talking about because it's Susan Kang Schroeder commenting, and she's the chief of staff there.

The name of the writer of the article rings a bell too - it's Paloma Esquivel, who wrote that moving story about Bob, where she mentioned the letter he wrote to Fontelle when they first reunited.

http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-professor-arrest-20131121,0,6244304.story#axzz2lbjo8OOQ

 

[Grainne Dhu]

The OC DA's office is chasing another cold case too. They have been busy. This is from 1995 in Santa Ana though. I know it's OC DA's office they're talking about because it's Susan Kan Schroeder commenting, and she's the chief of staff there.

The name of the writer of the article rings a bell too - it's Paloma Esquivel, who wrote that moving story about Bob, where she mentioned the letter he wrote to Fontelle when they first reunited.

http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-professor-arrest-20131121,0,6244304.story#axzz2lbjo8OOQ

That the OC DA's office is pursuing several (or many) cold cases is a good thing, I think.

When my first husband was getting his Ph.D in microbiology he belonged to a lab that sometimes was criticised because they did not have a unified approach, the way many labs do. Each grad and post-doc was doing their own thing and it was loosely connected by all being microbiology and often using fruit flies. However, that lab was also the most productive and innovative in the department and probably in the (major research) university. People might scoff that it seemed like the professor and chief researcher had accepted lab associates by lottery but they couldn't argue with his results.

Lab meetings were held once a week (as is common in research) and lasted a good half day (uncommon). Each person reported on their results, where they were going to go with them and where they expected to end up. Then everyone else would jump in and give feedback and ideas (um, sometimes not in their indoor voices). It was like watching fermentation of ideas live, right in front of me. Or performance art.

One of the post-docs was a woman from the USSR and she was aghast for the first few months in the lab. In her previous labs in Moscow, everyone worked on an aspect of the same problem and no one told anyone else "you're so wrong you can find your picture in the dictionary under W" (things got heated sometimes). She admitted, though, that her previous labs didn't get even 10% as much done. And then she lost her inhibitions, got right into the middle of the meetings and was teased with "we liked you better when you were too shy to talk!"

It was known as the crazy lab on campus and it is certainly true that they published like crazy (one of the major metrics for judging performance in microbiology is number of publications in peer-reviewed journals).

That's what I hope is happening in the DA's office. Rather than each case being handled in it's own sterile little bubble, I hope those detectives are interacting and letting their various ideas ferment like mad.

 

[zwiebel]

I imagine the best ones - like OC - have a mixed approach. A lot of the solved cold cases seem to have a particular saviour in the form of an investigator who takes an interest in a case and just cannot let it go. And spends weeks, months or years doing the hard slog of sifting through statements and documents etc.

When things start to show up or need testing, or people need to be interviewed etc, others step in. Quite often in the stories I have read about cold cases, there is something that sticks out about the person who is later charged. It may be odd behaviour, or discrepancies in their story that were missed the first time around in the urgency of the initial investigation.

Also, very importantly I think, there is often a new trail to follow in what people have done in the time since the victim disappeared or was found deceased. For example, a man whose wife disappeared who has since married his long term mistress that no-one knew about before. Or the child of wealthy parents who has used an inheritance to pay off ruinous debts that investigators were unaware of.

There are many disadvantages to investigating an old case, but I think there are a few advantages too! Including not having the media pressure that can sometimes lead to things being missed.

 

[zwiebel]

I have such a good feeling about this year - is that crazy? It's nearly over!

Has anyone heard about the women held in South London for 30 years in domestic servitude/slavery? It really is a case of a 1970s cult/political collective that didn't die when all the others did, it seems. And this year of all years was the one where they stepped into the light at last. Must be something special about 2013 and I've still got hope for news about Bob before the year is out.

If not.....I'll still be hoping.

I sometimes wonder if all the information posters here collected post disappearance has eased the way for investigators a tiny bit? It would be wonderful if it had.

 

[zwiebel]

Talking of progress, there is somewhere out there that's often not too delicate about possible deaths/homicides, and I'm sure I can't link it. But even there I've seen mention of how sad Bob's story is, and that there has been no progress. His and Fontelle's story touches everyone, when they are clear about what the story is. It's driving me mad though, because they haven't noticed the last news story and what Fontelle said.

Never mind, things have a way of getting out there somehow, in the end.

 

[Grainne Dhu]

I imagine the best ones - like OC - have a mixed approach. A lot of the solved cold cases seem to have a particular saviour in the form of an investigator who takes an interest in a case and just cannot let it go. And spends weeks, months or years doing the hard slog of sifting through statements and documents etc.

When things start to show up or need testing, or people need to be interviewed etc, others step in. Quite often in the stories I have read about cold cases, there is something that sticks out about the person who is later charged. It may be odd behaviour, or discrepancies in their story that were missed the first time around in the urgency of the initial investigation.

Also, very importantly I think, there is often a new trail to follow in what people have done in the time since the victim disappeared or was found deceased. For example, a man whose wife disappeared who has since married his long term mistress that no-one knew about before. Or the child of wealthy parents who has used an inheritance to pay off ruinous debts that investigators were unaware of.

There are many disadvantages to investigating an old case, but I think there are a few advantages too! Including not having the media pressure that can sometimes lead to things being missed.

BBM

And boy, has there been some interesting behaviour since Bob's disappearance. Things that were done that left me wondering if those people were raised by wild animals. Things that were not done that left me wondering what those people know that the rest of the world doesn't know.

And things that... heck, I have no way to classify except as bizarre in the extreme. I think I have a much wider than usual definition of what normal behaviour may consist of because I grew up in the 1960s and that probably warped my views a bit. But even by my wide definition of normal cannot encompass some of the things that these people have done.

Lots and lots of material there for an investigator.

 

[zwiebel]

We don't have knowledge of many of the financial ins and outs that may have taken place either. I've a feeling there might be fertile soil there.

 

[zwiebel]

There was such a huge gulf between people who grew up in the fifties and people who grew up in the sixties, wasn't there? I don't think there was ever anything like it. Not as far as teenagers were concerned, anyhow. They were invented then!

 

[Grainne Dhu]

We don't have knowledge of many of the financial ins and outs that may have taken place either. I've a feeling there might be fertile soil there.

Cubby has posted several times that a forensic accounting would probably reveal some very interesting things. Maybe start six months before Georgia's death and bring it up to the present? That would allow a forensic accountant to see what Bob's normal patterns were, how they changed after Georgia's death and if there has been any financial hanky-panky since then.

There have been some obvious beneficiaries to Bob's disappearance (AH being the major one) but I suspect there are one or more family members who benefitted behind the scenes.

 

[zwiebel]

Pressure certainly seemed to be on once Georgia passed. As has been suggested, that could just have been because of a fundamental misunderstanding about the nature of the trust.

I kind of feel there was less regard for Bob's feelings than there was for Georgia's though, and things were said and done to Bob that would never have happened if Georgia had been alive. It's almost as if there was a feeling that Bob didn't deserve to hold on to his own assets after his wife had gone, although that seems incomprehensible to me.

Could it have been a sort of projected/deflected anger, I wonder? If family had expected Georgia to leave them a generous windfall when she died, and they didn't want to feel resentment against her, so they projected it all on to Bob?

 

[zwiebel]

It's really hard to pick up a sense of any genuine compassion from close family towards this widowed, elderly man, from what we've seen. There seems to have been a detachment from even before Fontelle came on the scene.

JuM and JeM were the ones best friend PE said saw Bob most often, and were nice. So they were in the best position to put to rest any concerns about a rift in the family. They didn't care do it though.

 

[Grainne Dhu]

I keep thinking about finding Bob's remains. At this point, I think it is clear that Bob's remains are most likely to be found by some sort of outdoor activity enthusiast. So, I ask myself, how best to make that happen?

And the answer came: do a good Youtube and do everything to make it go viral. Not specifically a Youtube about Bob (although certainly he should be mentioned) but a video about the various ways human remains can look and if someone sees what they think are human remains, what they should do.

Then I asked myself "what would make a video like that go viral?" And my answer was "get a big name musician or band to provide a short song for the intro and end on the subject of love, loss and longing."

I may know such a band via one of those friend of a friend deals. The song would be right up their alley and they have a long list of charitable causes they've contributed money, their time and their creative efforts to. I would need to put together a cover letter and a small packet that goes over Bob's story so far.

So does anyone know who could do the "how to spot human remains" part? It needs to be someone who can provide samples in situ and who generally presents well.

And is anyone in direct contact with Fontelle? I think if the video led or ended with her saying a few words about Bob, that would be Youtube gold.

 

[zwiebel]

What a great idea.

I'm going back ages, but I seem to recall a long feature about a forensic anthropologist, and UID volunteers that was posted here because it mentioned websleuths. Does anyone else recall that? Or maybe a SAR professional would be more suited?

I'll have to think. Perhaps others have ideas about this?

 

[ELB]

No explanation was given, but eventually Long Lost Love was aired in the US and many more people became aware Bob was missing, and the program provided wonderful publicity for him. If you haven't yet seen it, it is well worth trying to catch it this time around. Several of the people close to Bob and his case consented to be interviewed, including two of his daughters, and his wife. Bob's youngest daughter and her husband, who was the last known person to see Bob, did not participate, sadly. She did provide some early publicity for Bob's case though, in the days immediately following his disappearance, and you can find those interviews on the links page.

Bob's son in law is said to have been helping out with the recent searches for missing hiker Alois Krost, in San Bernardino. Hopefully, a big public search can be held for Bob too, one day, as over four years seems a long time to have waited when an 81 year-old goes missing.

This post is dated November 2013. Wish this could happen for Bob too.

 

[Mahouston69]

Bob's son in law is said to have been helping out with the recent searches for missing hiker Alois Krost, in San Bernardino.

respectfully snipped.

Huh? That throws up a big red flag to me, in that his helping in searches for a missing hiker would only be to make sure nobody stumbled across Bob? Am I overthinking that? I hope LE has information about where exactly he searched or made it unnecessary for anyone else to search.