Still Missing CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, Chaffee Co, 10 May 2020 *arrest* #96

[swedeheart]

Discussion of the episode at 44:32 (short interview with Keith at the end):

 

[fcavanaugh]

That doesn't puzzle me. Do you think she would be texting JL after her husband got home! She was with him for the rest of the day and evening.

I might be able to buy she wouldn’t communicate with JL with BM present, but have a much harder time buying that she wouldn’t have opened Sheila’s Snapchat messages Saturday night especially considering Sheila’s daughters wedding was the next day. What I absolutely do not buy is that Suzanne didn’t use her phone at all on Sunday, Mother’s Day, when she was all alone after BM left.

IMO after spending Saturday afternoon and all evening with BM having not communicated with a soul since 2:11pm, had she still been alive on Sunday, she most definitely would have used her phone, opened/checked/responded to messages probably right after awaking, as she’d be alone at that point and would have been looking forward to conversing with JL, and imo she would have also checked Sheila’s messages from the night before knowing Sheila’s daughter’s wedding which she was to attend virtually was that very day. IMO, SM wasn’t alive on Sunday because she was murdered the day before by BM after he arrived home at 2:44pm. IMO, the fact that SM’s digital footprint ceased when she was home alone in BM’s presence never speaking to a soul again, ever, is absolutely damning for BM.

If you believe BM to be innocent, I’d be interested in your thoughts about why BM left for Broomfield 12 hours earlier than originally planned to leave with MG? What do you think caused him to change those plans last minute? Why he lied and said he slept through the night and woke up at 4.30am when his truck telematics show he was up opening and closing doors in the 3am hour? Why he lied and said he was working all day at “the wall” without having a permit and not allowed to work on Sunday’s and digital evidence shows he only “worked” there for 11-15 mins? Why he didn’t bring the appropriate tools to actually be able to do the job? And why he lied about where he was when he got the emergency call from the Ritters?
TIA.

IMHOO

#FindSuzanne
#BringSuzanneHome
#JusticeForSuzanne

 

[katydid23]

I f

Agree that Dateline was disappointing. I have come to expect more from them but that looked like an Iris & Dru production.

As for Barry's sister and all she said, just took that with a huge grain of salt and reminded me of the interview with Lori Vallow's sister & mother - as it turned out, nothing they said was true!

JMO.

I feel like , after the tremendous success of 'making a murderer'--[or whatever the title was]-----after the tremendous financial success of that documentary, EVERY production has been trying to recreate that, by selling the defense narrative exclusively.

Everyone wants to 'find' an innocent victim who was railroaded by the state.

There have been similar 'documentaries' about Laci Peterson's murder----where the whole production was biased towards Scott Peterson.

And a production company helped pay for Chase Merritts defense counsel, in exchange for exclusive behind the scenes access to the murder trial. Unfortunately for them, he was FOUND GUILTY--and so far not an inch of that footage has been released.

 

[Warwick7]

That doesn't puzzle me. Do you think she would be texting JL after her husband got home! She was with him for the rest of the day and evening.

She has never communicated with anyone from the moment Barry arrived home.

Barry's phone tells the truth, that he was the last one around her and now any communication from her is dead.

 

[Momofthreeboys]

Discussion of the episode at 44:32 (short interview with Keith at the end):

Thanks for sharing. Keith echos many in the end…no one can really predict how this will end. And Suzanne is still missing which is so sad.

 

[Cassady]

I am not a fan of the current DA and I agree that she has had an adverse impact on this prosecution from the very beginning. I hope she limits her role to making sure her prosecutors have the resources they need for a successful prosecution.

However, I question your belief that in this case, the government has all the resources necessary to assure a successful prosecution.

In fact, limitations on the resources available to law enforcement in the sparsely populated 11th Judicial District of Colorado may play a larger role than we will be able to know.

The 11th Judicial District's tax base consists of a population of less than 90,000 and a small struggling business community that gets more Than it gives in terms of public resources. These resources must serve four counties comprising tens of thousands of square miles, trying cases in four county seats that are a minimum of an hour's drive from the DA's office in Canon City. The last time I checked, the DA's staff consisted of 11 attorneys, a couple of paralegals and a few administrative assistants.

In this context, I suspect that counsel for both sides are frequently late arriving in court, since they are stretched thin. I am not inclined to judge their individual performance as lacking on this basis.

Aside from this observation, which may be based on urban expectations, I don't understand the basis for your observation that the prosecution does not seem well organized. Have you attended the hearings? Have you read the transcripts? If you have, please support your insights with specific examples.

Both the CBI and FBI assisted in this case. Both are more than adequately funded.

I have been involved in thousands of criminal cases. I have dealt with high quality county prosecutors and US attorneys across the U.S.

I have followed this case from day one and have read pretty much everything publically available. I have followed LS and other people who are reporting on this case.

IMO the state has not presented well and that is based on my training and experience...If you ask other legal observers...IMO...they would likely point to the same list of items I mentioned as misteps for the prosecution.

 

[Warwick7]

It was not just Saturday night. It was from early afternoon on Saturday. Barry has given no explanation about their activities until the single plate steak dinner followed by sex.
Suzanne obviously did not go on her usual afternoon bike ride, contact her daughters,friends or family.

I can count no less than 3 times Barry is quoted. Everyone of these times he skips over a particular section of time. As you said, he gives no explanation for what happened during that time.
This extremely alarming.

I'm going to try to screenshot the AA where I'm talking about.

 

[sk716]

That doesn't puzzle me. Do you think she would be texting JL after her husband got home! She was with him for the rest of the day and evening.

And she ignored Snaps from SO about her daughters wedding because ...

 

[Cassady]

Dateline seemed to be a pretty neutral piece and more of a framing for the actual trial which they obviously plan to cover.

The only thing that really stuck out to me on Dateline was all the clear images of the defendant's hands from the body cam videos. Both the palmar and dorsal sides of the hand are visibale at various shots.

These were especially visiable on a large screen TV. When I stopped the video I could not see any visible scratches on either hand....IMO.

The photos introduced by the state show scratches on his arm and his hand. Those scratches occurred at the same time IMO.

However, if those scratches are not visiable when the defendant arrived on the scene the day in question, then it is probable they occurred sometime after that date....IMO.

 

[Warwick7]

They left out that all of SM's communications, including those she was currently in the middle of, abruptly stopped when BM arrived home Saturday afternoon and there have been none since.

Annnnnnd what parent, particularly a mother, is going to shut off communication when her two precious daughters are out of the state and traveling.
Nope Nope No mother is going to do that.

 

[Warwick7]

Dateline seemed to be a pretty neutral piece and more of a framing for the actual trial which they obviously plan to cover.

The only thing that really stuck out to me on Dateline was all the clear images of the defendant's hands from the body cam videos. Both the palmar and dorsal sides of the hand are visibale at various shots.

These were especially visiable on a large screen TV. When I stopped the video I could not see any visible scratches on either hand....IMO.

The photos introduced by the state show scratches on his arm and his hand. Those scratches occurred at the same time IMO.

However, if those scratches are not visiable when the defendant arrived on the scene the day in question, then it is probable they occurred sometime after that date....IMO.

However, Barry himself didn't say they occurred sometime afterwards. He said it was from branches earlier in the week.

 

[Whitneyh]

The general contractor in an interview with Lauren and MG said the job was scheduled and planned but not for Sunday. That is the fact that is unexplained. There was a job…just not Sunday. The materials had not been ordered to be delivered Monday. That is a fact.

For a job that wasn’t for Sunday, which he didn’t work on but drove around the town throwing out trash from his truck and claimed it was a big job for Sunday, the day his wife happened to vanish. All of these little things string together well and when you combine it with the spy pen evidence him listening to episodes of a woman going missing on her bike. There’s a difference between reasonable doubt and pigs fly imo

 

[Cassady]

Cassady, I agree with you regarding lawyers working hard and earning their pay. And I sincerely appreciate your explanation.

I had read articles about these women before BM hired them. They are very respected in the legal community.

I have a nephew who is an attorney of the same caliber in Houston. Very well respected and well known for winning.

That said, it doesn’t change my opinion of a human being defending a murderer. If he is wrongly accused, okay. Go get ‘em! But when they can read the same AA that I can, and I am nothing, then they know their client is guilty. That’s when you back away or tell your client to admit to what they’ve done.

Am I dreaming? Maybe.

What matters to me is honesty in the profession you work. If they are going to represent BM because he has money, they should be presenting the homeless man who has none. And neither should get away with murder.

Oh that’s right. Its all about money. And winning the game. In that sense BM and his attorneys are on the same level. They earn a lot of money and he gets to keep Suzanne’s inheritance and walk free. Blood money I call it.

The reality is that most criminal defendants in the U.S. are represented by court appointed attorneys. Many of those attorneys do not make a lot of money. The really good and experienced public defenders do their job because they believe in the system and understand their role. They are not usually in it for the money.

I am not sure how you would operate a system wherein only the "innocent" people get attorneys. Who gets to determine when the state charges someone with a crime if they are innocent?

Sometimes the state gets it wrong and an innocent person is charged with a crime they did not commit. Our system relies on the counsel of criminal defendant's protecting their clients from such injustices.

It is a huge task for criminal defense attorneys. However, it is hard to do if the person accussed does not have an attorney representing them.

IMO our adverserial system is the best out there and it relies on quality representation for criminal defendants to actually work.

 

[Knox]

Dateline seemed to be a pretty neutral piece and more of a framing for the actual trial which they obviously plan to cover.

The only thing that really stuck out to me on Dateline was all the clear images of the defendant's hands from the body cam videos. Both the palmar and dorsal sides of the hand are visibale at various shots.

These were especially visiable on a large screen TV. When I stopped the video I could not see any visible scratches on either hand....IMO.

The photos introduced by the state show scratches on his arm and his hand. Those scratches occurred at the same time IMO.

However, if those scratches are not visiable when the defendant arrived on the scene the day in question, then it is probable they occurred sometime after that date....IMO.

One thing I noted in the body cam footage the night he arrived on the bike scene. Barry has his hands in his pants pockets, maybe it was just cold. But it looks odd to me.

 

[Cassady]

However, Barry himself didn't say they occurred sometime afterwards. He said it was from branches earlier in the week.

And that was what, May 13th?

Was he referring to branches while searching for the victim?

 

[Cassady]

One thing I noted in the body cam footage the night he arrived on the bike scene. Barry has his hands in his pants pockets, maybe it was just cold. But it looks odd to me.

May...in the evening....in Colorado...at altitude...probably a little chilly...IMO.

There were several clear shots of both hands and on both sides of the defendant's hand in the body cam videos...IMO.

 

[CGray123]

Both the CBI and FBI assisted in this case. Both are more than adequately funded.

I have been involved in thousands of criminal cases. I have dealt with high quality county prosecutors and US attorneys across the U.S.

I have followed this case from day one and have read pretty much everything publically available. I have followed LS and other people who are reporting on this case.

IMO the state has not presented well and that is based on my training and experience...If you ask other legal observers...IMO...they would likely point to the same list of items I mentioned as misteps for the prosecution.

Sorry, but I don't know you from Adam's off ox, and IMO, no one should trust your unsupported conclusions any more than anyone else's (including mine). Please, let's see that training and experience applied to several examples from what you have read.

 

[CGray123]

Both the CBI and FBI assisted in this case. Both are more than adequately funded.

RSBM. Last time I checked, the US Attorney was not helping to staff the prosecution of this case, which was my concern about resources. I don't believe the investigation suffered from lack of resources.

 

[Momofthreeboys]

One thing I noted in the body cam footage the night he arrived on the bike scene. Barry has his hands in his pants pockets, maybe it was just cold. But it looks odd to me.

Barry’s hands in his pocket seems to be a habit he has.

 

[Cassady]

Sorry, but I don't know you from Adam's off ox, and IMO, no one should trust your unsupported conclusions any more than anyone else's (including mine). Please, let's see that training and experience applied to several examples from what you have read.

I am not sure how having the prosecutor show up for court 1/2 hour late, missing court ordered discovery deadlines, being found in violation of court ordered pre-trial publicity orders, having to remove one of their main investigators from the case because of thier testimony at the prelim, and that same investigator subsequently getting a Brady letter are all positive s for the state?

In my 20+ years of experience as a trial lawyer, these are misteps by the state....IMO. SR from Crime Talk, who also has a lot of criminal law experience, has similar thoughts.

I would love to hear other attorney's take on this. All I can do is provide my insight based on my experience...IMO.