Found Deceased CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, Chaffee Co, 10 May 2020 *Case dismissed w/o prejudice* #108

[Teche]

We have to appreciate the Bobcat shown here!

I thought the same.

 

[Honeynut]

That would be a huge game changer!

I'd watch that YouTube video, can you share the link, tia.

 

[ar3593]

I've even thought that if the girls do think their dad killed their mom, they may be hesitant to voice any confirmation because he's the only parent they have left. Surely they saw their dad abuse their mom and possibly abused them. Imagine your dad killing your mom, you may just wonder if you open your mouth if he'll kill you too.

I have posted something similar in the past, they have to fear him. If they spoke out about their beliefs, their lives would be in danger. Such a dicey and horrible position for those daughters to be in. Straight out of your worst nightmare....

MOO

 

[RickshawFan]

Yes, I don't think it would be a prison snitch. Either someone who knew it all initially, or...imagine, Barry knows he's being watched. He knows he shouldn't approach Salida. But LE is searching close to initial place he hid her. Would he, potentially, ask an old "friend" or anyone to help, for $$$$, to move the body? The person might have taken the $$$$ then realized it made them an accessory...

For some reason, I am thinking, the hunters. Remember them being scared of him?

I'm thinking "confidential informant" is an LE invention to spook BM.

 

[girlhasnoname]

I've even thought that if the girls do think their dad killed their mom, they may be hesitant to voice any confirmation because he's the only parent they have left. Surely they saw their dad abuse their mom and possibly abused them. Imagine your dad killing your mom, you may just wonder if you open your mouth if he'll kill you too.

Agree, some of those sit down 'family' videos show the girls with very pained, and uncomfortable smiles and body language.

JMO

 

[justtrish]

It could or couldn't be true but if it was true, doesn't that make LE look weak publicly saying "We were looking for another person but stumbled upon Susannes remains" I would think it looks better to say "We found her remains and we are not going to comment any further". Unless LE wants to "look weak" as a strategy. I don't know.. just my thoughts

I don't think it makes LE look weak to say they were looking for X, but found Y. Colorado is vast and Barry had plenty of time unaccounted for. They could not search every place, that isn't realistic and just not possible. They searched the most likely areas based on the data they had from his phone and truck. I think if tips come in that suggest a new location they can search those places, but where would they even guess to start searching without an idea of a location? Look at how many hunters find remains out in the middle of nowhere 5, 10, 20+ years after someone is missing. Police can't search thouroughly for 100s or 1000s of remote acres just hoping to find a body.

 

[RickshawFan]

IMO, he left both their phones at home and 5 hours gave him plenty of time to travel to Moffat, prepare shallow grave, dump Suzanne in said grave, and travel back to Puma Path. Remember he’s a skilled landscaper and big he-man trophy hunter (gag!), meaning, he had/has the necessary skills and tools to work fast and expeditiously.

Snipped for focus....

Are you heading towards suggesting he cut her up? Removed all her flesh? This would speed up decomposition, presumably.

 

[SleuthBee]

Yes, I don't think it would be a prison snitch. Either someone who knew it all initially, or...imagine, Barry knows he's being watched. He knows he shouldn't approach Salida. But LE is searching close to initial place he hid her. Would he, potentially, ask an old "friend" or anyone to help, for $$$$, to move the body? The person might have taken the $$$$ then realized it made them an accessory...

For some reason, I am thinking, the hunters. Remember them being scared of him?

The help I think he needed most was the use of a vehicle.

 

[Chimera]

I've even thought that if the girls do think their dad killed their mom, they may be hesitant to voice any confirmation because he's the only parent they have left. Surely they saw their dad abuse their mom and possibly abused them. Imagine your dad killing your mom, you may just wonder if you open your mouth if he'll kill you too.

Bolding mine.
Ita.
Imo, the evil and threats run deep with BM !

Pretending to act all hurt about the 'harm' to his "integrity" ....
Who knows what he may have said to his daughters or to anyone else who dares to cross him ?
Omo

 

[steeltowngirl]

The help I think he needed most was the use of a vehicle.

I’m still wondering about the #5 PE went on about.
Could he have (would he have) used a fire dept vehicle?

There was missing data from his own truck‘s telematics.
Phone was in airplane mode.

Station #5 Chaffee County Fire station is only a few miles along the road from PP.

Station 5 | Chaffee County Fire

16820 County Road 220, Salida, CO 81201Station 5 is the newest of all the Chaffee County Fire Protection District locations. This station was made possible through a very generous land donation by Dr. Brown and family.

www.chaffeecountyfire.org

Puma Path to 16820 Co Rd 220

maps.app.goo.gl

 

[Seattle1]

Following BM's release from jail on $500k cash bond Sept 2021 -- here's a link to a great refresher on the case, citing the facts and evidence.

Posted: 5:00 PM, Sep 20, 2021
Updated: 10:01 PM, Sep 21, 2021

Barry Morphew released on bond; affidavit claims he fabricated stories surrounding wife’s disappearance

Barry Morphew posted a $500,000 cash bond and was released from jail Monday as the affidavit for his arrest, which details the allegations into why he was arrested for the murder of his wife, was released to the public.

www.denver7.com

 

[RickshawFan]

I still can't quite figure out how close the grave was to the main road - looks to me like the reporter had to go down a second road or maybe a creek bed. A driver's eyes are focused on the road and not completely dark adapted, not like someone out on that prairie, digging a grave, with a shovel. And I'll say again that he wasn't so far from the main road that he wouldn't have been able to see cars coming and make himself basically invisible until they passed by. He may very well have adapted his criminal behavior to the local conditions (just as the Albuquerque killers did).

Snipped for focus...

The reporter is near the crime scene TAPE, but we don't actually know if that tape marks the crime scene. If I'm LE, I'm not leaving crime scene tape festooned on bushes. It's an invitation to media! But that might well be the point. I can't think of any reason why LE would leave crime scene tape out there at all, unless it's for a red-herring. I'll bet the actual burial site is not right there, but in a place only known to LE and the killer.

 

[GoJacks]

Snipped for focus...

The reporter is near the crime scene TAPE, but we don't actually know if that tape marks the crime scene. If I'm LE, I'm not leaving crime scene tape festooned on bushes. It's an invitation to media! But that might well be the point. I can't think of any reason why LE would leave crime scene tape out there at all, unless it's for a red-herring. I'll bet the actual burial site is not right there, but in a place only known to LE and the killer.

This is a nice thought and all but it seems like a lot of residents of Moffat reported that’s where CBI was digging ‘waste deep’

But also, low key annoying they would leave their trash out there. Doesn’t make much sense to me.

 

[10ofRods]

I think this clearly indicates how self serving IE is.

For all she knows, a smoking gun has been found in that gravesite, in which case her comments are going to be very embarrassing. But she is simply shameless.

Any credible attorney states that her client maintains his innocence, delivers a message from her client, and says they will wait for what the investigation will reveal.

You don't stake your own personal credibility on a grave find where you have no idea what has been found. Especially you don't start manufacturing a new theory of the case based on wild speculation

Agree. Strongly. She's a flash n the pan, to begin with. She will soon be synonymous with "defends only guilty men." IMO (if she's not already).

She ought to have only delivered a specific (jointly written) message from her client. But she went off on her own thing.

She has no idea what they found at Suzanne's grave. It's disrespectful obviously (which she should patent as her style) but it's also bad lawyering. I don't care how famous she is in Colorado, it's still not good lawyering. (See what I did there? Her actions are in between "bad" and "not good.")

She lost real credibility, unless her actual goal is to do PR for a living. She is not his criminal attorney right now, so she gets to sit and wait like all the rest of us while LE recalculate charges.

I strongly believe there will be charges against BM. While I am a bit pessimistic about the forensic evidence itself, the fact that there's now a body (just over the hill from Puma Path, really) is incredible. And there will be SOME evidence from the grave and the body that helps the State. It cannot be otherwise.

If no clear cause of death is found (no strangling, no shooting), then it points even more to someone who possessed, admitted to using (in other circumstances) and did use animal anesthesia on his wife. On the very day he came home and caught her in a convo with her lover - which is exactly what he was hoping to do.

Not once has he shown that he's still looking for her. Or begging her to at least contact her daughters. Nothing. He's been in hiding since Day 1. No annual remembrances. No attendance at vigils. Just carrying SHOVEL into a hotel - which most people will recognize as a digging tool (whether or not there's still soil analysis, let's be real: most people have common sense).

IMO. Sorry for the somewhat rant-like quality of what I just typed - but I can't help but have strong reactions to your well thought-out posts.

 

[JerseyWasHome2]

This is a nice thought and all but it seems like a lot of residents of Moffat reported that’s where CBI was digging ‘waste deep’

But also, low key annoying they would leave their trash out there. Doesn’t make much sense to me.

In Debbie Collier’s case, internet sleuthers walking onto the scene after LE was finished found blue latex gloves and various bits of evidence LE didn’t think to take with them or clean up. One even found an unrelated bullet on the ground. I guess it happens.

 

[Seattle1]

The help I think he needed most was the use of a vehicle.

Recalling that even though the Ritters living near Puma Path Rd requested to be named in a protection order against BM, as a condition of his bond release, in September 2021, one family that welcomed BM back to the hood was the Cushman family (offered him lodging on release). Cushman's are part-year residents that lived next to the Morphew's, and it's also believed BM had access to a vehicle* they left behind.

At a Chaffee County hearing Wednesday, 11th Judicial District Judge Patrick Murphy said he can’t legally make Barry Morphew move from the property known as the "Cushman home" in the Monarch Estates subdivision off of Puma Path in Maysville, Colorado, which overlooks the house where he previously lived with Suzanne before her disappearance on May 10, 2020.

Colorado judge allows Barry Morphew to continue living near marital home despite GPS tracking issues

A Colorado judge on Wednesday ruled that Barry Morphew, charged with murdering his missing wife, Suzanne Morphew, could continue living at a luxury Airbnb rental home in the same neighborhood where the couple once resided, even though his GPS monitor has no reception there.

www.foxnews.com

ETA: For clarification, BM had access to a vehicle* at the time of SM's murder.

 

[Gardenista]

Why wasn't this search completed before they released that she was found? These people just love giving Iris ammo.

Extensive search done Friday near where Morphew remains were found: What we know

The Friday afternoon release from CBI was scant on other information, but Denver7’s crew on the ground gathered some exclusive details about the search.

www.denver7.com

 

[JerseyWasHome2]

Agree. Strongly. She's a flash n the pan, to begin with. She will soon be synonymous with "defends only guilty men." IMO (if she's not already).

She ought to have only delivered a specific (jointly written) message from her client. But she went off on her own thing.

She has no idea what they found at Suzanne's grave. It's disrespectful obviously (which she should patent as her style) but it's also bad lawyering. I don't care how famous she is in Colorado, it's still not good lawyering. (See what I did there? Her actions are in between "bad" and "not good.")

She lost real credibility, unless her actual goal is to do PR for a living. She is not his criminal attorney right now, so she gets to sit and wait like all the rest of us while LE recalculate charges.

I strongly believe there will be charges against BM. While I am a bit pessimistic about the forensic evidence itself, the fact that there's now a body (just over the hill from Puma Path, really) is incredible. And there will be SOME evidence from the grave and the body that helps the State. It cannot be otherwise.

If no clear cause of death is found (no strangling, no shooting), then it points even more to someone who possessed, admitted to using (in other circumstances) and did use animal anesthesia on his wife. On the very day he came home and caught her in a convo with her lover - which is exactly what he was hoping to do.

Not once has he shown that he's still looking for her. Or begging her to at least contact her daughters. Nothing. He's been in hiding since Day 1. No annual remembrances. No attendance at vigils. Just carrying SHOVEL into a hotel - which most people will recognize as a digging tool (whether or not there's still soil analysis, let's be real: most people have common sense).

IMO. Sorry for the somewhat rant-like quality of what I just typed - but I can't help but have strong reactions to your well thought-out posts.

I believe it’s possible to be strangled or asphyxiated without breaking the hyoid bone tho. So while many think he tranquilized her perhaps to the point of death, we just don’t know that. It is of course very strange that that item was found in the dryer, but maybe it was never used, or he shot and missed and then just smothered her with a pillow or whatever.

 

[kittythehare]

KOAA News5
@KOAA

Former Douglas County Sheriff Tony Spurlock calls it a "marathon," not a "sprint".

koaa.com
Cold case expert says investigation into Suzanne Morphew's death will take time
The investigation into the death of Suzanne Morphew is now a “marathon” rather than a “sprint,” according to one veteran law enforcement officer and a national cold case expert.

1:00 PM · Sep 29, 2023

2 months.
I'm not surprised.
I just don't know how we are going to stay sane for another 2 months, at least..

 

[10ofRods]

This is a nice thought and all but it seems like a lot of residents of Moffat reported that’s where CBI was digging ‘waste deep’

But also, low key annoying they would leave their trash out there. Doesn’t make much sense to me.

They do that because they are NOT finished. For example, as an anthropologist, I am sometimes asked to visit a particular scene. I can't just drop what I'm doing, to do that. I have given affidavits and professional opinions in several cases (not hundreds, but certainly more than a dozen). I cannot possibly arrive at any crime scene without several days notice. Most consultants have day jobs, often doing academic research. Indeed, any "expert" who isn't also publishing and working in an academic capacity is a bit suspicious to me.

The soil analysis alone (there are maybe 5 different types of experts for that) will require the experts to know where the crime scene is.

If I were in charge of such an investigation, I'd have several crime scene photographers come out (that's how I started in forensics - as a crime scene photographer, and I wasn't particularly good at it, not even after a year of doing, at which point I quit - the job had really high turnover, to say the least). The guy before me became a sheriff's deputy, because it was less emotionally difficult than being a crime scene photographer.

Really good close-up pictures of soil could be ordered by a geologist. A geologist might be asked to come out. MANY different things. The tape is there to warn the public not to go into the crime scene (everyone knows that these days, that might not work - but hopefully, any good journalist will know not to mess with the crime scene).

Certain parts of this crime scene will be investigated fully, as with any murder victim. There will be layers of pollen and dirt on the grave that are distinct from what's on the body (this does little to find a suspect, but it will make it clear WHEN Suzanne was put there - if that becomes an issue at trial). I predict that even the Defense will be willing to stipulate that Suzanne was placed there in May, 2020. While we may never hear about it at trial, that work does get done in the background, obviously. Just in case.

IMO.