IA - Mollie Tibbetts, 20, Poweshiek County, 19 Jul 2018 *Arrest* #40

[Confusion]

How is the type of corn in the cornfield relevant.

This murder, where the victim was left in a cornfield, probably has nothing to do with the type of corn in the cornfield.

I think someone may have already answered this, but my understanding s that field corn is left to get a lot riper which means an extra month or two before harvesting. There are differences in the corn too, but I think that's the only difference that would make a field of sweet corn less desirable for his purposes. MOO

 

[Warwick7]

BBM

Dumb?

Psychology students?

Who knows how to ditch a cell phone when committing a criminal activity? Isn't that what Rivera did? The digital signal led from Mollie's abduction to 10 miles SE of Brooklyn. The digital signal did not lead from the body location site to Rivera's house. It looks like he had enough tech knowledge to leave his digital trail near the body, but not hear his house.

We don't know that investigators asked if he had every seen her jogging, but it is part of his story that he had seen her jogging prior to abducting her on the night that she was jogging.

Did he put her in the trunk when he abducted her, or did he pull in front of her, open the side door, push her in, pull a u-turn, and take off?

Ok, I trying to process this happening.
Yes, very easily he could have thrown her in the trunk. Then how do we account for the earbud on his lap? (landed on the ground kept it as a trophy).
Pull in front of her.... The she had to have been jogging on the left side against traffic. This would work.
Or, drove past her, did a u turn, and then coming back snatched her and thrown her in the back seat (but to do that she would have had to be running "with" the traffic.
How would he control her or subdue her in the back seat?
At some point the body was struckor slashed multiple times with a sharp object.

 

[SharonNeedles]

No doubt he knew what type of corn it was in that area. That video really shows the vastness of the fields in the community.

It’s pretty much all the same type...

 

[Jealoushe]

Well in that case, how could noone smell a body where it was found? Was it that far away from anything?

Yes. You have to be within 20-30 ft to smell anything. The smell would have only been there a few days.

 

[Warwick7]

Maybe he stopped to pick up a knife and a change of clothes.

Could he risk a relative saying: "Hey lets run into town and get some bruskies!'

 

[otto]

Agree. I don't think there was any conversation. He had to come up with a reason for his raging block out. Had to find a way to back up his lie. IMO

What better way to blame the victim than to suggest that his biggest fear of being discovered as an illegal alien was threatened by a woman who was out jogging and minding her own business.

He approached her for some reason, and unreasonably she threatened his illegal status and way of life? Not likely.

On that basis he threw her into his vehicle, forgot all about it, and then came-to at a cornfield with an abducted woman in his vehicle?

He may have explanations for what he did, but there are no excuses.

 

[Warwick7]

It occurs that he may have known the type of cornfield it was and how late that field would be harvested (buying the max amount of time before she was discovered), given his length of time in the area and occupation on a dairy farm where cows are fed field corn.

Granted: 'knee high by the 4th of July' means by the 17th it may only be should high or a little more. Tender sharp thinner dark green leaves. Even so, try walking into a cornfield 20 meters and not lose your bearings. Especially given he was moving around breaking stalks and covering her up. He must have "known" his north, south, east, west very well.

 

[MsBetsy]

BBM

Dumb?

Psychology students?

Who knows how to ditch a cell phone when committing a criminal activity? Isn't that what Rivera did? The digital signal led from Mollie's abduction to 10 miles SE of Brooklyn. The digital signal did not lead from the body location site to Rivera's house. It looks like he had enough tech knowledge to leave his digital trail near the body, but not hear his house.

We don't know that investigators asked if he had every seen her jogging, but it is part of his story that he had seen her jogging prior to abducting her on the night that she was jogging.

Did he put her in the trunk when he abducted her, or did he pull in front of her, open the side door, push her in, pull a u-turn, and take off?

That last part we couldn't possibly know, in my opinion. But I do think he would have enough knowledge to turn off or disable the phone either before or right after he started his attack.I'm not sure what the very beginning of your message means.... dumb, psychology students, etc, maybe that's part of another post. But in regard to the phone what confuses me is the fact that the info. they have shows the time to be 7:45 - 8:28. So apparently the phone was turned on or this was just the moments leading to the attack until he attacked and got the phone from her. My point was many people thought he would not think to turn the phone off, and I find it surprising that he would not. My comment about the jogging was to suggest that he had been planning to carry this out days in advance, and was just waiting for the perfect moment to isolate and strike, whether investigators asked him about this or not.

 

[Charliegizmo49]

Clear your browser's cache.

My history? I’m old. I hated acronyms when I wrote the state budget and it was full of them. I sometimes have to guess at acronyms when I read them here. So if I heave to ask to clarify have patience.

I actually enjoy the intellectual exchange here. If you compare other social media to this site, the smarter, most informative and analytical posts are right here.

Thank you my WS friends.

 

[otto]

I live on what, 20 years ago, would have been considered a country road. Times have changed and I now have 700 new neighbors, but I still walk my dog on my road daily, and there are at least three deer carcasses off the side of the road as I walk, all of which I have seen in all the varying stages of decomposition. It is definitely not a pretty sight, and a day or two after death, the smell is VERY noticeable, and vultures or buzzards will camp out at the spot for several days. I do not know how far the area where Mollie was left is from a home, or how well the field is tended, but I still am amazed that she was not found until her alleged killer (yes, that IS what I will continue to call him) led LE to her. JMO

The smell of death is distinct, and it's the same for all mammals.

Don't assume vultures. Are there vultures in Iowa and Brooklyn?

 

[SharonNeedles]

I have to admit, I had the body location completely wrong. I thought it was much closer to the pig farm. Now that I realize my mistake, I am for sure rethinking my theories.

Do you think the last digital signal by the pig farm most likely means that's where he ditched or disabled the phone? The pig farm looks like it has a pull off. Do you think that was his original destination but he changed for some reason? Why go south that extra ways only to go back north to 460? Or do I have the pig farm location wrong, too. Ugh.

Let me ask you, otto, why do you suppose the TA truck stop was a POI, but not the Pilot?

For what it’s worth, the TA truck stop is the logical place to stop when entering or leaving Brooklyn. That’s what you would call the Brooklyn exit.

 

[otto]

I wonder if he knew the cornfield area beforehand as a “makeout” spot. Lots of that happens in those field pull offs in corn country. I had a friend in high school who’s father was a farmer and he was always chasing kids off his land where the secluded pull offs were.

Was the body dump site a "make-out" spot?

For whom?

 

[otto]

For what it’s worth, the TA truck stop is the logical place to stop when entering or leaving Brooklyn. That’s what you would call the Brooklyn exit.

Of course it is. Truckers stop to shower, do laundry, and look after business.

It's an obvious spot for the suspect to stop on his way into Brooklyn, but reports are that he stopped at Caseys food store. It's an unlikely spot for the suspect to stop after the murder because users of the facility need a pass.

 

[gliving]

Google does too

Yep. I can easily guess his preferred genre of *advertiser censored*.

 

[MsBetsy]

I got the impression that she was saying she was panicked about MT missing, and she asked him and everybody else if they knew anything. It's no wonder we can't figure anything out, it seems like almost everything said could be taken at least a couple different ways. MOO

I thought she was talking about the responses she got from him. I didn't even think of that. To me it seems like that was the point they were trying to make. Who knows. Now, since you confused me, I am going to have to read it all over again. Ha ha. Very nice picture of her though, don't you think? I wonder how much persuading that took? ( yes, I'm being sarcastic.)

 

[Stormy21]

"Feed corn" is harvested before it's fully mature. So it might buy him a few weeks or a month or more if the field was not of the feed corn variety. Farmers harvest the feed corn earlier--stalks and all--chop it up while it's still green/not fully ripe and store it in silos to feed dairy and other cattle.

It's not 'feed corn'.

It's field corn. Harvested mature, or way beyond. The stalks are basically dead - yellow and dried up. If it's a a cool year (which it never is anymore), the crop may not be harvested until November. Otherwise Mid Sept to mostly October.

Corn must be dried out. If wet the farmers use fans or other ways of bringing the moisture down.

An amount of field corn may be used for corn syrup, sweeteners, gasohol, but the majority is for animal feed.

Corn is all clean. The husks and the stalks are separated at the 'combine' or 'corn picker' and spread over the field. Like this: combine (with a corn head) captures the stalks, Corn is gleaned, then kernels are shelled out to be stored in a gain bin (about 400 bushels). It is subsequently transferred, clean to trucks. The stalks, cobs, etc as spread out the back with a 'fan'. Most corn is transported to a grain elevator in town.

IDK about 'chopping' it. Maybe in North Dakota where the quality isn't good.

There are dozens of varieties of field corn. Genetically modified. Every company claims their variety is best. Must be huge money it in. I suppose there are differences in maturity, but it all stays in the fields until Mid Sept or so. Some of those stalks can be 12 foot tall, and very very dense.

If there were a body in a field it would be extremely hard to identify. I would think even when harvesting the crop a combine could not discern what is in the rows. IDK.

 

[otto]

and I think he could have wandered around a little bit deciding where he was going to leave her.

On the main roads, or back roads?

 

[TL4S]

Was the body dump site a "make-out" spot?

For whom?

CR and his ex?

 

[otto]

Agreed. I'm not the OP, but I can confirm that the odor of a human body is something that is unlike anything else. Worse than animals. Not to be morbid of course, but my father and I went for a walk down our street a few years ago, and we smelled something horrible near this one particular house. We reported it, and it turned out the man that lived there had been dead for a week. It was in the middle of a Florida summer (August) as well.

BBM

Actually, the smell of a dead mammal, whether human or mammal, is all the same.

"Morbid"?

 

[Stormy21]

CR and his ex?

If one wants to 'make out' off a traveled road near a field. That's not very cool.

BTW V21 is blacktop as I recall. The major county roads are hard surface, not gravel.