siliconrod
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Feb 21 2020
Defence draws attention to other man seen on the night Tess Richey disappeared
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''On Thursday, court saw footage that showed Schlatter and Richey walking together at 4:14 a.m., heading into an alley towards the area where her body was found.
The video shows Schlatter come out of the alley alone roughly 45 minutes later.
The officer who examined the video, Det. Stephen Matthews, told the court he watched for at least two hours after that and did not see anyone going to or from that area, nor did he see Richey emerge.''
Together with the DNA, there is so much compelling evidence against the accused. I'm amazed there wasn't an insanity defence. Wonder if his counsel tried to persuade him but couldn't?
CAUGHT ON CAMERA: Tess Richey's final moments with accused killer?
•Feb 26, 2020
The autopsy shows that she had marks around her neck (broken blood vessels, etc.) that indicate she most likely was strangled by something--so falling down the stairs is not going to be a convincing argument.On the subject of jailhouse information and whether it's considered hearsay or not, the law in Canada is much looser than the law in the US. I'm pretty much always surprised just how much so every time I dip into it.
In the US, it's pretty likely the admissibility of those statements would be challenged. Self-incriminating statements are more or less always expected to be recorded here. In cases where statements are not recorded, there will almost always need be corroborating physical evidence and even that is beginning to be challenged since the "jailhouse informant" culture has been shown to be spiraling. Convicts with nothing but time on their hands and increasing indoctrination into the legal system can engineer information that while actually false or mostly false might tend to be supported by physical evidence they may also be aware of unbeknownst to investigators who may not even know where that information originally came from.
In Canada, the current law is simply that if hearsay is "reliable and necessary" it is admissible. A law enforcement officer is automatically presumed reliable and since it places Schlatter at the scene of the crime it can be considered necessary so it's admissible, period. Never mind the additional context of his supposed coldness about Tess's death being in conflict with his reactions in court and during official questioning. I've had girls I've made passing contact with end up dead and I would definitely have different reactions to it in casual conversation with my peers than I would if presented with details of their final moments and photos of their decomposing corpses.
Of course, in none of those cases was I anywhere near or in any possible way involved in their deaths so I can't say how that might have effected my perspective or attitude in either conversation and in cases where I was initially identified as a person of interest (internally to the investigation) I was quickly eliminated as an actual suspect. I don't know how much my reaction to that initial police contact contributed to the elimination versus the pure facts but I feel pretty damn sure that if I was taken into custody any statements I made anywhere would have been recorded.
It's a shame the jury in this case, in the year 2020, is being denied the opportunity to directly evaluate Schlatter's jail cell statements - a second clear failing of law enforcement on top of the poor initial search effort (I suspect Tess's mother moved the body before the scene was investigated). This is a case built on circumstantial evidence and in that sort of case, the jury's perception of the defendant's character is crucial. That circumstantial evidence is strong but as I said before this twiddly nerd really does not seem like a killer. I certainly wouldn't be afraid alone in a dark alley with him and if I was a juror I think I could pretty easily be convinced there was reasonable doubt that he killed her as opposed to her maybe just drunkenly falling down the stairs.
I see the link at the top of this page. Between that and the jailhouse informant offering up scarf as the murder weapon I'm convinced but will all 12 members of a jury be? Or however many they use in Canada.The autopsy shows that she had marks around her neck (broken blood vessels, etc.) that indicate she most likely was strangled by something--so falling down the stairs is not going to be a convincing argument.