IA - Mollie Tibbetts, 20, Poweshiek County, 19 Jul 2018 *Arrest* #36

[duster1979]

Have you ever cooked a fresh ear of corn? You have to cut the end off. It requires a sharp kitchen knife.

Those are ears, not stalks. He didn't boil her up some roastin' ears, he covered her dead body with corn stalks.

 

[KaaBoom]

I'm not nearly caught up....just jumped to the last. Does anyone think he stabbed her when he got out of his car on 385th and that is how he got her in his car?

My gut feeling is that raped her and stabbed her in the corn field.

 

[tabitha111]

I dated a homicide detective for a few years. He told me that Interview 101 is you buddy up to the perp...you find out things he likes to do like fishing for instance and then you say that you like to fish too. Or you sympathize with him in some way. You become his "friend", you are just like him, you are so understanding...

 

[El Mago]

I don't think Mollie threatening to call police is what led to her death. First, that whole scenario is just his story, we don't even know if it happened at all. But even if it did, it didn't matter. Her death was practically inevitable. That evening when he began searching for and following Mollie, it was for one purpose only: to abduct and rape her. And he knew full well when that was over he would need to kill her. It was the plan all along.

Agreed.

Plus, iirc the key surveillance footage from the neighbor near Middle St. and Boundary showed CR driving around there multiple times? Definitely a guy with a plan.

 

[Jerrod]

When the police questioned him they may have made him believe they knew more than they did.

Yes, I think LE played him like a drum.

 

[MsBetsy]

I grew up on a dairy farm with 500 cows and a few bulls and have never seen or heard of castration by machete. This was before dairy farms employed so many immigrants so maybe things have changed?

Yeah, I too have a hard time picturing a farmer yielding a machete for the purpose of castration. Exactly how does that work? Never mind.

 

[Inthedetails]

People have wanted to overthink this thing from the start. "Oh, heck, it CAN'T be a Barlow knife, lots of people have those. He worked for a farm so it has to have something to do with farming!"

Maybe he threw blades from a rotary hoe like Chinese throwing stars.

Right. The knife doesn't have to be linked to his job on the dairy farm. Plenty of people have knives on their person, in their cars, in their homes - and they don't use them on their job. We don't have to wonder what kind of knife a dairy farmhand would have.

And, we honestly don't know the weapon was a knife, though that does seem like the most likely possibility.

jmo

 

[Mica]

Agreed.

Plus, iirc the key surveillance footage from the neighbor near Middle St. and Boundary showed CR driving around there multiple times? Definitely a guy with a plan.

Like a shark circling its prey.

 

[Jim G]

He needs to face American justice with savage finality.

 

[spiritkiss]

According to the ME's website, autopsy reports are given to immediate family members. Not that they would or should, but Mollie's family would likely be the only source of more information (until court, of course).

https://www.iosme.iowa.gov/document/family-request-autopsy-report

I believe you have to request an autopsy report 1st. You have to be direct family to get a copy of the report. They do not just send one to you or give you one.

 

[dreamwarrior66]

"Honestly, it's a miracle he confessed and showed LE the body." this.......why did he? This is the part I do not understand he says he in essence can't remember the killing but the shows LE where the body is. Make no sense to me at all. Why not just deny it completely.

The reported cause of death changes everything. This case just became much more frightening. If she was killed on her route, there would be blood everywhere. He'd have been covered in it. Dismissing his confession, I'd say he'd been looking for someone to take for awhile now and knew exactly where to hold someone. He drove out there looking for her as he'd seen her before, saw her jogging and kidnapped her, held her for 3 weeks in a location where nobody could hear. The phone and fitbit were destroyed at WC's farm land, on the way to the hiding place, trying to frame him. That poster that talked about WC following him may have been the killer. The pleas to release Mollie didn't sway him. He hated women and took out his frustrations on her.

 

[Stormy21]

Oh, dear. I really didn't mean the imaginary machete would be used to neuter animals. I know it is too crude a tool. I inadvertently linked the the two.

There is a large 'corn knife' that looks like a machete. It chops stalks, but I don't know if anyone has those anymore. Then there are the smaller 'paring knives'.

Every farm kid I knew carried a jack knife or folding knife -- often to school. But things have changed. The antisocial kids modified them to be 'switch blades'.

 

[Inthedetails]

This may be stupid but: on average there are 800 kernels on an ear of corn (can be 400). Usually 16 rows. Rows are almost always even number -- they are the female parts. the tassel is the male part. There is one silk per kernel.

I never know what new things I'm going to learn by following a case, but I always learn something!

 

[MyBelle]

Ha! Bad technique. One hand on the corn, the other on the end. Quick snap. Only wimps use knives. (teasing)

I suppose preparing corn is like picking crabs, or something regional. You learn it from constant repetition. My mother and grandmother could totally strip all the kernels off the corn in a microsecond with an extremely sharp 'corn knife'.

This may be stupid but: on average there are 800 kernels on an ear of corn (can be 400). Usually 16 rows. Rows are almost always even number -- they are the female parts. the tassel is the male part. There is one silk per kernel.

A sharp object was the murder weapon. I do not believe the killer used his hands to break off very tall, thick green corn stalks to cover the body.

 

[geevee]

Just saw the article with the preliminary autopsy report - my mind if just reeling. Oh (((Mollie))).

 

[1987]

we also don't know who the car exactly belonged to. it could have been a car that he at least felt like was his exactly without reguard to whos name was on the title. he might have kept a lot of his belongings in his car for all we know. I know here around me the migrant or whatever you want to call them workers pile up in any structure that will keep the rain off them and room for a sleeping bag is room enough and the cars/trucks they drive are full of what looks like everything they own in their life.

 

[Jeng1810]

I also don’t think he woke up & planned on killing MT that Wed. He might not have abducted & murdered a stranger before, but I believe he has mistreated women in his past. Behavior like this doesn’t begin out of the blue at 24.
In his case, that would mean that he had been somewhat respectful to women for 2 decades and then *Boom* kidnaps a stranger, kills her (possibility of SA). He might not have abducted a female before, but I bet he’s tried several times.

IMHO, it’s highly likely he has Sexually Assaulted females before now, either a stranger, ex- g/f, or relative. Not saying it did happen just that I think it is highly likely. IMHO his behavior escalated to this point, where he felt confident enough to take a stranger and kill her. I don’t think he has control over his emotions, but I do think it’s sexually motivated and he’s fantasized about abduction. I think he possibly kept himself prepared in case he actually acted out his fantasy & did it.
He’s only 5’6 and 130 lbs, which means he had to choose someone smaller—like MT. He probably thought she was pretty & saw her vulnerability because she was in an isolated area. If he just wanted to chat, he probably wouldn’t have picked such an isolated area (out of view of stores & their cameras), but instead would have stopped circling & chosen a more convenient place to join in the run.

I wrote this from my phone, so I apologize if I am unclear in my comments

I agree it was completely opportunistic and he definitely had zero intent on just chatting her up. He doesn’t strike me as the type of dude who got out of his cars in running clothes to impress a girl!!! . He got out and quickly subdued her to avoid attention.

 

[Pixie Dust]

He had to have a knife to cut the cornstalks to cover her body. This guy knew exactly what he was doing. JMO

Excellent point.

 

[Hatfield]

My gut feeling is that raped her and stabbed her in the corn field.

JMO
I agree. We already know he lied already. Because the way he had us believing was he just got mad while he was running alongside her. NO He brought some kind of weapon along with him in order to stab her. So its not like he wanted to have a friendly chat with her. He brought a weapon!

His story is a bunch of crud IMO.

His intent was to rape her from the get go. He saw her jogging on streets that he knew would have no houses around and so he took that opportunity to attack her, rape her, and kill her.

Waiting for more news to confirm.

 

[spiritkiss]

Now remember the autopsy only said cause of death was sharp force injury's. Thats what actually killed her. That does not mean there were not other injury's involved that she could have survived from. I think he knocked her out on street and carried her to his car.