I have followed this case, and this forum for years. Up until recently, I was convinced of Darlie's innocence. At this point, I am not sure either way. Lots of questions in my mind.
1. Why not kill all the kids? Who leaves one child alive, if the motive is to rid their life of the burden of motherhood? And why leave the most demanding child (infant) alive. Life insurance is a weak motive, they did not gain financially. Furthermore, even though everyone implies they were broke, they weren't. Broke people cannot come up with the kind of money they did for Darlie's defense. How many of you honestly have 5k in savings today? They did, and had many items that they could have sold off rather than kill their kids.
2. Why call 911 when one of the victims is still living? Damon was alive when EMS arrived. Darlie had no way of knowing if he would die before they arrived, or tell on her if he was.
3. There are reports of other crimes in the area that night. But none were really looked in to. The traffic stop in which the car was allowed to go because of Darlie's 911 call is the one that bothers me the most.
4. The timeline is shoddy. You cannot convince me that Darlie was able to pull off everything that needed to occur. The sock, the staging, the blood being wiped up, etc. Damon had up to 9 mins to live, and 6 mins were while D was on the phone with 911. Cutting herself up, knocking over furniture, getting blood on the sock, ripping her clothes, etc would have been LOUD and time consuming. And would she be brave enough to run down an alley full of motion lights in a white shirt and risk being seen?
5. I do believe she could have slept through the murders. People with collapsed lungs or lungs full of blood don't make much sound. You need air exchange for sound to occur. Sleeping children could have been silently killed.
6. Darlie is not a smart gal. At best she is of average intelligence. Yet we are expected to believe that she was smart enough to inflict her neck wound using her left hand, she was smart enough to inflict near perfect defensive slices to her finger tips, thrust a knife into her arm bone, and even bite the insides of her own cheeks? She also managed to slice up her night shirt. She apparently is way smarter than she seems.
7. Her neck wound/breast wounds. This is a superficial woman. They spent a lot of money on her appearance. Would she really hack up her most prized possessions- her DD breasts? Furthermore, why cut her own throat, she would have inflicted her injuries in less obvious places.
8. The necklace- It was embedded in her neck wound. Common theory is that Darlie slit her throat over the sink. Her necklace would have been hanging down due to gravity, so we are to believe she stuffed the necklace into the wound? The necklace had knife damage on it. Given the fact that it was embedded into the wound, with knife damage on it, it is most likely she WAS lying down when her neck was cut.
9. The couch- stop claiming there was not blood on it. YES there was. Look at the crime scene photos. You can see where the outline of her pillow ends, and the blood is there. The pillow shielded the area it was covering.
10. The towels. They are all over the crime scene photos. It is quite clear to me that if your neck is profusely bleeding, you would apply a towel. Both Darin and Darlie said they were applying wet towels to the boys, and those towels appear in multiple pictures. Therefore, Darlie (while bleeding) was standing with a blood soaked nightgown over the sink wetting towels. Of course watered down blood will be on the counter edge, the sink, and the floor.
11. Yep, there was blood under the vaccuum. You can't tell me in the chaos, that EMS, police, Darlie, etc didn't move anything. You cannot rely on that fact when it is clear that things were moved all over the place from one photo of the scene to the next.
12. No glass in her feet. We all have feet. They are tough, thick skinned, etc. to prevent cuts. Just because one wine glass broke does not automatically imply that her feet had to be cut. I've walked on broken glass and felt it, but not been cut by it. It didn't shatter into a million pieces.
13. No other crimes happen like this? Yes they do. Apparently people do not read as much as I do. Try looking up the Keddie murders (3 kids slept through that one, with 3 others murdered way more savagely than this case), Jaclyn Dowalaby was taken without anyone awakening, Julie Rea was railroaded in a case similar to Darlies. There are hundreds of cases of people randomly killing others in break ins.
14. There is the possibility of an intruder. While it is most likely the fingerprints are Darlie's, they factually remain unidentified, therefore we cannot 100% say they are not an intruders. There is also hair that hasn't been matched. Yes, a pubic hair could arrive at a crime scene a million different ways, but until we can prove the way, the intruder is still possible.
15. The nurses. This makes my blood boil. I am an RN. You cannot chart one thing, and testify to another. They clearly indicated in their charting that Darlie was tearful, sad, and grieving appropriately. They did not use words like "fake" or "indifferent". Why were their licenses not called into question? Either the testimony was false, or the charting was false. One is perjury, one is a HIPAA violation.
16. Silly string. Dana's idea, that was made out to be way more than it is. Odd, yes, but not something Darlie had any part in planning. Also, as an RN, let me tell you, people become pretty silly when they are taking Valium, Ativan, etc. She was likely chewing gum because of the cotton mouth side effect of those medications. She was prescribed sedatives/antianxiety meds following the murders.
17. Surgery. The neck and arm wound were serious. Doctors just don't do surgery for fun. The necklace had to be surgically removed because of its proximity to the carotid. In medical terminology, the word superficial implies that something is "above." Your skin is superficial to your carotid artery. Your platysma muscle is also superficial to your carotid artery. To the general public, superficial means "skin deep." The words should not be confused. Being within the carotid sheath is a BIG deal, that means she was a paper sheet thickness away from a very hasty death.
18. Something I noticed- when 911 asks how old the boys are, she tells them 6 and 8. Yet, Devon was not 8, he was still 7. If she had murdered him, and knew he was dead, he would be eternally 7. By stating that he was 8, means she expected him to turn 8 a few days later. It implies that she expected the future with him to continue. If you have ever followed Jonbenet's case, it is much like the fact that JonBenet's headstone states that she died Dec 25. I feel this is because Patsy knew she died before midnight. (And why make her date of death Christmas Day if you aren't sure- doesn't that further tarnish the holiday?) Yet no one supposedly knew that JonBenet was even missing until 0545 on 12/26. That has always bothered me.
19. Before you ask, YES, I have read the transcripts. I find that the error's make me mistrust it, even though it has since been corrected. Yes, Darlie was a hot mess on the stand. Yes she changed her story many times. However, I think in a traumatic event that this is not that unusual. The psychologist who examined her did not feel she was capable of committing the crime and that she has some traumatic amnesia. Again, more common than you think, and something I see at times in my profession.
20. The castoff. Darin has said many times, that he was attempting CPR on Devon. When you blow air into lungs full of holes, it will spurt out. It is possible that the blood came from this. Also, I challenge you to kneel down, and act out stabbing the floor below you, and realize how far over your head you need to weild that imaginary knife to get cast off down your back. These were small kids, the knife would never have needed to come way back over the head of the killer to re enter the victim, and these were little kids, it would not have needed a ton of force. Also, with all of the wet items being placed into paper bags together, it is hard to know what blood was transfer vs cast off. I have read that the blood is very questionable for cast off to being with.
21. The whole investigation stinks. Court reporters being removed, cops pleading the fifth, illegal taping, interviewing witnesses under the influence of sedation/anesthesia (should have been thrown out, you can't sign a consent for surgery if you have had Tylenol 3, but you can be interrogated after awakening from propofol?) Texas is known for their love of the death penalty. I don't want to see Darlie end up like Todd Willingham. Even if it means finding out for sure that she did do it, I think a new trial is owed to her.
Sorry for the lengthy post, but I have wanted to get that off my chest. I am sure I left out many other things, but these came to mind. I would love to hear opinions, theories, etc on the doubts that I have raised.