Still Missing CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, Chaffee Co, 10 May 2020 *arrest* #98

[al66pine]

Last person to see her (alive)?

... Barry... Admits to being the last person to see her alive.

@justtrish sbm for focus. Just jumping off your post, not directing this to you.

BM is not the only hapless defendant to make this ^ admission but still insist that he has no idea what happened to spouse/MisPers.

Ex: In hypothetical LE interview of hypo. husband of empty-nest-couple, he says, we had ordinary, peaceful weekend at our house, then Monday 5:00 a.m. I drove to airport to fly (to city 500 mi. away for a one or two day business trip), so yeah, I was the last one to see her. Or he says, last one to see her alive.

Pretty much like sequence w BM. I can't think of any case names ATM, but we've seen this many times.

If wife has been reported missing (maybe by son or dau. not reaching her) how does hubs. know he was the last to see her?

What if, after he left home/headed to airport --
- UPS delivery required wife to sign for a package?
- A friend returned to wife a punch bowl borrowed for a baby shower that weekend?
- In walking down driveway to put birthday card into mailbox, wife & neighbor backing his car out of garage exchanged greetings?
- Nosy neighbor invited herself over to ask wife what was in UPS package?
- While still at mailbox, wife & jogger from next door said Hi to each other?
- The Schwan Food truck came by; driver rang door bell for possible order, but wife said, TY, not today.

Not saying any of these happened at PP home. Just saying, unless wife was already dead when BM/ husband left that a.m., he could/would not know that something similar could/did happen; he could not legitimately say he was the last to see her alive.

These kinds of events are inconsequential in day to day life. But in the context of a planned or unplanned homicide, any in-person contact w wife, like the ^, could happen.

If husband says, I was the last one to see her alive, then he must know her time of death and must know that none of those events did occur after he left the home. So she must already have been dead when he left.
Ironic? Yep imo my2ct.

 

[mrjitty]

Defense would say Was she missing for 13 hours? That is the time span that is being speculated. It could be much greater than 13 hours. From her last image to whenever the Ritters went to the house I think would be more accurate. Prosecution is running on the assumption it was Barry and that is the assumption it is the 13 hours.

My question is an evidential one. In order to raise reasonable doubt, there has to be a real possibility (not just fanciful) that SM was alive snoring in bed before 4am when the accused leaves.

It's common cause SM was missing by the time people went to the house

The prosecution has multiple evidence points which raise the inference SM was already missing on Saturday.

So that isn't speculation on either side. Defence is a positive assertion by accused. Prosecution is a strong evidential inference.

It's a hell of a coincidence that SM went missing on saturday, only to really go missing on sunday. So my question is - how do you raise reasonable doubt here?

I just can't get past this point, not matter all the Sturm und Drang from the defence pre-trial.

 

[coastal]

Here's another one for you: While being interviewed by local TV news about the missing Mcstay family, Chase Merritt, "business partner" and "best friend" of Joseph McStay, said, "I was the last person Joseph saw".

Indeed. Merritt was convicted of murdering Joseph McStay, Joseph's wife, Summer, and their two young boys Joseph Jr. and Gianni, and burying them in the desert.

Eta: I am responding to @al66pine's post #801, above.

 

[mrjitty]

Here's another one for you: While being interviewed by local TV news about the missing Mcstay family, Chase Merritt, "business partner" and "best friend" of Joseph McStay, said, "I was the last person Joseph saw".

Indeed. Merritt was convicted of murdering Joseph McStay, Joseph's wife, Summer, and their two young boys Joseph Jr. and Gianni, and burying them in the desert.

Eta: I am responding to @al66pine's post #801, above.

Yes!

That was a hell of a blunder!

 

[mrjitty]

My personal take is this won't really be a SODDI defence because the evidence for it doesn't exist.

The lazy bumbling prosecution will be on trial for railroading the accused instead of looking for the real killer.

I also think there might be a nod and a wink aspect to it. Maybe the accused really did it (e.g a jealous fight), but we can't really know what happened that night and maybe it wasn't murder. So you'll have to let him skate.

 

[katydid23]

One thing I am interesting in is whether the Telematics or App/Cloud set up are going to show signs of tampering for the Broomfield trip in variance to the preceding days, and the trip back.

In the McStay case, the digital evidence was enhanced at trial compared to prelim. It can be subtle things... e.g testimony as to log in stamps to a cloud server

One of my theories is that BM deleted the journey data from the cloud to hide his next journey/the left turn.

That would be devastating to the defence case.

Yes, the digital evidence in the McStay case was devastating to the defendant. In particular, I remember they mapped out his cell phone route during a several week period---and it showed his cell being at various local casinos for hours at a time.

Of course the defense was trying to deny that the suspected killer had a gambling problem, thus had no reason to keep stealing from Joseph McStay. Looking at the cell ping map and seeing his phone hovering outside a casino for 7 hours at a time, while his family was being evicted for non payment of rent, was very damning/
[they also had him taking out 500 dollars at a time from various casino ATMS--and the defense tried to say he wasn't gambling---it was just a convenient place to get an ATM withdrawal---lol]

I am hoping there will be a similar type of digital presentation for this jury as well. Maybe a cell phone journey from Puma Path past the bike and helmet, and then from garbage drop to garbage drop until arriving at the strange hotel parking lot visit?

 

[katydid23]

Barry's case is also very similar to Mark Redwine's murder case.

Mark told agent Grusing that the last time he saw his 11 yr old son, Dylan, he was sound asleep very early in the morning. And just like Barry, Mark had to leave early and go to work, hugging his loved one goodbye, never to see them alive again.

And in both cases, it was the lack of electronic usage that morning that was a red flag for investigators. In fact, much like Suzanne, young Dylan stopped communicating with everyone quite suddenly, the previous night. He had plans to see his best friend the next day, and in the middle of texting about those arrangements, Dylan stopped communicating with him. And he never texted his mom the next day, which he always did when he was out of town at this father's cabin.

So both of these cases have a similar shape of events. JMO

 

[MaisieBella]

Last person to see her (alive)?
@justtrish sbm for focus. Just jumping off your post, not directing this to you.

BM is not the only hapless defendant to make this ^ admission but still insist that he has no idea what happened to spouse/MisPers.

Ex: In hypothetical LE interview of hypo. husband of empty-nest-couple, he says, we had ordinary, peaceful weekend at our house, then Monday 5:00 a.m. I drove to airport to fly (to city 500 mi. away for a one or two day business trip), so yeah, I was the last one to see her. Or he says, last one to see her alive.

Pretty much like sequence w BM. I can't think of any case names ATM, but we've seen this many times.

If wife has been reported missing (maybe by son or dau. not reaching her) how does hubs. know he was the last to see her?

What if, after he left home/headed to airport --
- UPS delivery required wife to sign for a package?
- A friend returned to wife a punch bowl borrowed for a baby shower that weekend?
- In walking down driveway to put birthday card into mailbox, wife & neighbor backing his car out of garage exchanged greetings?
- Nosy neighbor invited herself over to ask wife what was in UPS package?
- While still at mailbox, wife & jogger from next door said Hi to each other?
- The Schwan Food truck came by; driver rang door bell for possible order, but wife said, TY, not today.

Not saying any of these happened at PP home. Just saying, unless wife was already dead when BM/ husband left that a.m., he could/would not know that something similar could/did happen; he could not legitimately say he was the last to see her alive.

These kinds of events are inconsequential in day to day life. But in the context of a planned or unplanned homicide, any in-person contact w wife, like the ^, could happen.

If husband says, I was the last one to see her alive, then he must know her time of death and must know that none of those events did occur after he left the home. So she must already have been dead when he left.
Ironic? Yep imo my2ct.

Bingo.

 

[mrjitty]

I am wondering in particular if the prosecution may be able to prove that the fuse for Sync/GPS was pulled.

Two ways you could do that would be

1. Recreate pulling the fuse and see if you get the same error log

2. See if BM's truck stopped logging data to the cloud at the relevant time.

IMO there is likely to be some expert analysis in this area that was not presented at prelim.

 

[mrjitty]

Barry's case is also very similar to Mark Redwine's murder case.

Mark told agent Grusing that the last time he saw his 11 yr old son, Dylan, he was sound asleep very early in the morning. And just like Barry, Mark had to leave early and go to work, hugging his loved one goodbye, never to see them alive again.

And in both cases, it was the lack of electronic usage that morning that was a red flag for investigators. In fact, much like Suzanne, young Dylan stopped communicating with everyone quite suddenly, the previous night. He had plans to see his best friend the next day, and in the middle of texting about those arrangements, Dylan stopped communicating with him. And he never texted his mom the next day, which he always did when he was out of town at this father's cabin.

So both of these cases have a similar shape of events. JMO

Yes - i just don't see how the defence can get around this aspect. Of course in thwe redwine case they always knew he did it, they just had to wait for the body to turn up. In this case we don't have the body, but when you look at everything, the body doesn't change much.

 

[K9Enzo]

I seem to recall posters on here saying that “perhaps” BM used airplane mode to conserve battery, etc.

But I’ve never seen any statements by BM or SM ( or about them) that they did that.

In fact, BM consistently denied putting his phone in airplane mode.
He said he couldn’t recall doing it.
Then he said if he did it, it was accidental.
Then he suggested that SM did it .
Then he finally admitted that he did it saying not because he was doing anything wrong, just so he could tell her haha you couldn’t track me.

https://www.courts.state.co.us/userfiles/file/Court_Probation/11th_Judicial_District/Chaffee/cases of interest/21CR78/21cr78 Morphew Redacted Affidavit.pdf

Thank you @Cindizzi for your detailed response to my question!

 

[Kemug]

What if, after he left home/headed to airport --
- UPS delivery required wife to sign for a package?
- A friend returned to wife a punch bowl borrowed for a baby shower that weekend?
- In walking down driveway to put birthday card into mailbox, wife & neighbor backing his car out of garage exchanged greetings?
- Nosy neighbor invited herself over to ask wife what was in UPS package?
- While still at mailbox, wife & jogger from next door said Hi to each other?
- The Schwan Food truck came by; driver rang door bell for possible order, but wife said, TY, not today.

Yes! How could BM be sure that he was the last one to see her alive? To the above possibilities we can add phone calls and text exchanges. He could only be sure he was the last one to see her alive if he was the first one to see her dead.

 

[DizzyB]

Last person to see her (alive)?
@justtrish sbm for focus. Just jumping off your post, not directing this to you.

BM is not the only hapless defendant to make this ^ admission but still insist that he has no idea what happened to spouse/MisPers.

Ex: In hypothetical LE interview of hypo. husband of empty-nest-couple, he says, we had ordinary, peaceful weekend at our house, then Monday 5:00 a.m. I drove to airport to fly (to city 500 mi. away for a one or two day business trip), so yeah, I was the last one to see her. Or he says, last one to see her alive.

Pretty much like sequence w BM. I can't think of any case names ATM, but we've seen this many times.

If wife has been reported missing (maybe by son or dau. not reaching her) how does hubs. know he was the last to see her?

What if, after he left home/headed to airport --
- UPS delivery required wife to sign for a package?
- A friend returned to wife a punch bowl borrowed for a baby shower that weekend?
- In walking down driveway to put birthday card into mailbox, wife & neighbor backing his car out of garage exchanged greetings?
- Nosy neighbor invited herself over to ask wife what was in UPS package?
- While still at mailbox, wife & jogger from next door said Hi to each other?
- The Schwan Food truck came by; driver rang door bell for possible order, but wife said, TY, not today.

Not saying any of these happened at PP home. Just saying, unless wife was already dead when BM/ husband left that a.m., he could/would not know that something similar could/did happen; he could not legitimately say he was the last to see her alive.

These kinds of events are inconsequential in day to day life. But in the context of a planned or unplanned homicide, any in-person contact w wife, like the ^, could happen.

If husband says, I was the last one to see her alive, then he must know her time of death and must know that none of those events did occur after he left the home. So she must already have been dead when he left.
Ironic? Yep imo my2ct.

I want to know exactly who Barry contacted once he “knew” she was missing. He had a long drive home. Did he call Sheila? I would think so, since they communicated daily. I bet he didn’t even know it was her daughter’s wedding day, since it didn’t involve animals. He probably paid zero attention to things like that.

 

[MrsWatson]

I want to know exactly who Barry contacted once he “knew” she was missing. He had a long drive home. Did he call Sheila? I would think so, since they communicated daily. I bet he didn’t even know it was her daughter’s wedding day, since it didn’t involve animals. He probably paid zero attention to things like that.

I'm also very curious about his first phone calls after he knew. We know GD showed up at the bike site fairly early on, but who else did BM call? It remains suspicious to me that since BM was a volunteer fire fighter, he did not immediately reach out to LE himself. Or at the very least, call the fire chief and ask him to reach out to LE, the fire chief likely knew people in LE. Ask them to do a welfare check. NOT send his neighbors.

 

[BeachSky]

RSBM

Looking for a bear ... at night ...

….lions & tigers & bears!
Only a murdering Narc would use so many animals on his alibi.

moo

 

[BeachSky]

Think Mark Sievers. They don’t care who they victimize in their narrative IMO

I'm also very curious about his first phone calls after he knew. We know GD showed up at the bike site fairly early on, but who else did BM call? It remains suspicious to me that since BM was a volunteer fire fighter, he did not immediately reach out to LE himself. Or at the very least, call the fire chief and ask him to reach out to LE, the fire chief likely knew people in LE. Ask them to do a welfare check. NOT send his neighbors.

 

[Momofthreeboys]

I'm also very curious about his first phone calls after he knew. We know GD showed up at the bike site fairly early on, but who else did BM call? It remains suspicious to me that since BM was a volunteer fire fighter, he did not immediately reach out to LE himself. Or at the very least, call the fire chief and ask him to reach out to LE, the fire chief likely knew people in LE. Ask them to do a welfare check. NOT send his neighbors.

There might be more, but this is all I had from the AA:

At 3:30PM, Barry sent an outgoing message to Suzanne “Call me”

At 5:15 PM, Barry received an incoming call from Jeanne Ritter.

At 5:45 PM, Barry received another incoming call from Jeanne and Martin Ritter.

George believed he called Barry between 5:30PM to 6:00PM.

At 6:03 PM, Barry exited his hotel room

At 6:05PM, Barry made an outgoing call to Martin Ritter.

At 6:09PM, Barry made an outgoing call to MG

At 6:20 PM, Barry made an outgoing call to REDACTED.

At 7:10 PM, Barry received an incoming call from REDACTED (Chaffee County Sheriffs Office).

At 7:21 PM, Barry made an outgoing call to Suzanne.

At 7:33 PM, CCSO dispatch called Barry and informed in a 1 :32-minute call that Suzanne’s bike was found.

It's a 2 hour 45 minute drive roughly from the hotel to the location of the bike I would guess on a low traffic early Sunday night unless he was speeding.

 

[Megnut]

If Barry was in Broomfield, hard at work, with workers present, how'd he know Suzanne went for a morning "bike ride"?

Maybe she dropped her phone in the veggie stew and wasn't missing at all, was just shopping for clothes online and then went on her normal afternoon ride... well, I mean if she wasn't dead.

He didn't create a workable alibi for himself on either day. Nor did he create a credible storyline for Suzanne.

Double fail.

JMO

 

[susiQ]

My question is an evidential one. In order to raise reasonable doubt, there has to be a real possibility (not just fanciful) that SM was alive snoring in bed before 4am when the accused leaves.

It's common cause SM was missing by the time people went to the house

The prosecution has multiple evidence points which raise the inference SM was already missing on Saturday.

So that isn't speculation on either side. Defence is a positive assertion by accused. Prosecution is a strong evidential inference.

It's a hell of a coincidence that SM went missing on saturday, only to really go missing on sunday. So my question is - how do you raise reasonable doubt here?

I just can't get past this point, not matter all the Sturm und Drang from the defence pre-trial.

“Sturm und Drang.” Love it!!

 

[charminglane]

Yes! How could BM be sure that he was the last one to see her alive? To the above possibilities we can add phone calls and text exchanges. He could only be sure he was the last one to see her alive if he was the first one to see her dead.

@Kemug
Very succinct.
Thank you.