Coming back to revisit the case. After rereading this thread, and others, I just can't help but think that this was a targeted killing. The theory that it was a thrill kill, or a serial killer does not really fit with the fact that there was a getaway car. i also discount the guy who was said to be a homosexual and patrolled the beach on his bike. Why would he have a car parked at the supermarket?
I agree that it would be shocking if this wasn't a targeted killing - because of all of the pre planning. Unfortunately there wasn't a single detail or fact uncovered to suggest any of the murdered individuals would have been targeted for anything. I think it was unfortunate that the news did a special report on the guy from prison. That entire lead came because a citizen in another state wrote a letter that basically said, "Gee, I remember a mafia hit that involved a bike as a getaway." (that actual incident wasn't even similar.) So the investigator literally went to purchase the book and thought, "Well, we've got nothing else, let's look into this." So he writes to this mafia hit man and, unfortunately, gave so many details about the killings to this prisoner in his introductory letter, there wasn't a single factual detail that the prisoner came up with that would suggest anything he said was true. He even kept getting Mr. Barrows name wrong, which was interesting, because he got it wrong in the exact same way that it was spelled wrong in the letter from the investigator. It was just very clear that lead went nowhere. And neither did any of the leads police had about the Barrows or Dumois families having anything in their pasts that would lead them to be targets.
Doesn't mean they weren't, but without a scrap of evidence, we must consider other possibilities.
I think the only thing the multiple getaway vehicles tell us is that this person planned to kill that day. That doesn't necessarily mean he knew WHO he planned to kill.
The purpose of parking a vehicle in a different area would be a simple as not wanting the plates detected. I'm certain the killer thought that biking from one scene to the next would enable him to get off the island more quickly undetected. Also the bike was necessary for the ruse to get into the vehicle in the first place.
The main takeaway is even if it was a targeted hit, the perp pretty much did it in the most risky and visible way possible. There were much easier ways to go about it than to plan a ruse to get in the vehicle and then open fire in a moving vehicle, then ride his bike to his getaway car. Most of that plan is stupid and unnecessary if the sole purpose is to kill someone(s).
If this person targeted them, they followed them to the island, so they likely knew where they were staying. If someone was hired to kill one or more of the Dumois family, the much less risky choice would have been to kill them at night in their rental cottage and drive away. It was a little house on a quiet street that would have allowed for an easy escape with no traffic.
The other lead about the gay guy who rode a bike around town was another lead that was nowhere near fleshed out, and I didn't even see any suggestion that police even looked at any of the "leads" brought to them by the PI. None of that is documented in the file. But I will say, just based on how the area is, many people familiar with the area bring bikes to ride the area and leave their vehicles parked. It's a great place to bike near the water, but folks who want to do that who don't live on the island have to bring their bike over via the bridge if they don't live within comfortable biking distance from home.
I get why you feel the way you do, though. I felt the same way before I read all of the reports. Without any evidence pointing either way, it's still a possibility. But looking at the actions of the perp on that day, I certainly don't think a thrill kill situation is off the table. It's at least equally likely, given all we know.
When I recently spoke to an investigator who looks at cold cases in the Manatee County area, he mentioned that other cases had gone the same way, basically a wrong lead was followed that led down a rabbit hole for a long time. He was interested in checking into possible similarities with other still unsolved cases. So I do know it's something they're at least considering. He was specifically interested in comparing ballistics from this and a couple other cases.
