MA - Vanessa Marcotte, 27, murdered, Princeton, 7 Aug 2016 #3

[FindHG]

I'm sorry I'm still not following. Yes her cell phone "pinged" at 2:25
At the cell towers near mountain barn....but in a town that doesn't even have cable cell towers are spread out too, so it's possible that tower was just the nearest to her even if she had been home at her moms just through those woods.

I am confused also as to what you mean by a cut through from ball hill to Worcester road? Ball hill runs into Worcester road.

Apologies for being confusing, ThinkHard. The clearing that runs between the two roads with the electric lines. It's just across Ball Hill Road from Cobb Lake. Right here from on Street view

There's a lot about this crime that makes me feel where she was found was staged to look like a random act of violence and a crime of opportunity.

Given the police log reports of a car around 115 and another at 3...I do wonder if she was picked up by a vehicle (maybe willingly) and something happened and then the perp tried to cover it up and point the investigation in a different direction.

also ps I'm not trying to doubt you just wanted to understand your train of thought. Also just FYI I am local so some of the things I might say aren't in any attempt to "argue" with your perspective...just rather to give local insight that hopefully would be helpful in hashing out theories/possibilities.

I very much and truly appreciate your patience and that you respond at all. Being local makes you an absolutely fabulous source for any kind of feedback, thank you.

 

[twbcpa89]

I know, it doesn't make much sense. It's a "just if?" thought. I'm having a hard time with the idea that he would be parked near the crime scene since a car would draw attention to him. If he planned to not be noticed while he lit a fire wouldn't having his car nearby increase his risk of being noticed, identified, or caught in the act. He would have wanted to control his environment with the least amount of risk to him. Since runners, church goers, bikers tend to use that road, he risked being noticed stalking there with a car. He could have ridden or walked back to a parking lot nearby maybe?

I don't know why, but I have this image of him knocking her off the road from behind, then setting upon her. She was smart, aware of Karina's case in NYC maybe, so not an easy target for a ruse. It would've been hard to that with a car, but on a bike, I can see it.

Following you here with the bike idea; but, if he was on a bike, why dispose of it (especially so close to the scene)?
To me it would seem more conspicuous to have your bike found by LE in the woods than to just park it in your garage.

In the Sarah Fox Murder investigation (see article), DNA found on a chain during occupy-wallstreet protests, 8 years after her murder, was matched her possible killer using CODIS.

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Sarah-Fox-Murder-Mystery-DNA-Linked-Occupy-Wall-Street-Subway-Gates-161989375.html

If LE could recover DNA from a chain, they can recover it from a bike; and, unless it's pink or something, its not that suspicious to have a bike in your garage.

However, what if the car was the ruse? (see police log of man spotted next to vehicle with hood up on Brooks Station Rd.)

Edit: That is some awesome sleuthing to find that bike thing though, seriously.

 

[ThinkHard]

Apologies for being confusing, ThinkHard. The clearing that runs between the two roads with the electric lines. It's just across Ball Hill Road from Cobb Lake. Right here from on Street view



I very much and truly appreciate your patience and that you respond at all. Being local makes you an absolutely fabulous source for any kind of feedback, thank you.

That cut through would be quite a bit south from where she was found. It also would be in the opposite direction from Westminter. So I don't think one would use that as a get away from that crime. It's also not a place you could ride a bike, too over grown. You'd have to walk that distance.

 

[FindHG]

u/FindHG:
If you are going to go back through the threads; there is some really great sleuthing on page 50-67 of thread #2.
Not sure why none of those great conversations carried over to thread #3??

I think we were on a really good track with the discussion of police log books as they relate to local attempted abduction cases (IMO).

In the most recent press conference, LE was asked about whether they were looking into other incidents. At about 3:20 mark, a reporter asks DA Early about another incident. You probably have seen this already.

[video=youtube;dfgfp0taR7w]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfgfp0taR7w[/video]

Following you here with the bike idea; but, if he was on a bike, why dispose of it (especially so close to the scene)?
To me it would seem more conspicuous to have your bike found by LE in the woods than to just park it in your garage.

In the Sarah Fox Murder investigation (see article), DNA found on a chain during occupy-wallstreet protests, 8 years after her murder, was matched her possible killer using CODIS.

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Sarah-Fox-Murder-Mystery-DNA-Linked-Occupy-Wall-Street-Subway-Gates-161989375.html

If LE could recover DNA from a chain, they can recover it from a bike; and, unless it's pink or something, its not that suspicious to have a bike in your garage.

However, what if the car was the ruse? (see police log of man spotted next to vehicle with hood up on Brooks Station Rd.)

Edit: That is some awesome sleuthing to find that bike thing though, seriously.

Rather far fetched on my part, though. You're kind . Thanks again for letting me know where to look on the thread. Am learning a lot.

 

[FindHG]

That cut through would be quite a bit south from where she was found. It also would be in the opposite direction from Westminter. So I don't think one would use that as a get away from that crime. It's also not a place you could ride a bike, too over grown. You'd have to walk that distance.

Thank you. That makes great sense.

 

[twbcpa89]

In the most recent press conference, LE was asked about whether they were looking into other incidents, at about 3:20 mark, a reporter ask DA Early about another incident. You probably have seen this already.

[video=youtube;dfgfp0taR7w]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfgfp0taR7w[/video]

No. I hadn't seen the Q&A session, but I think that reporter is asking the right questions.
Those Northborough attempted abductions seems way similar to VM's case (IMO).
Someone in thread #2 spotted the hood-up car in the police log as another similarity to that case (I agree).

Nearby attacks/attempted abductions:

a. Westborough/Northborough, MA, 6/23/16 (22mi. away): http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/men_try_to_abduct_women_in_sep.html
b. sketch of Northborough perp:http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/police_release_sketch_of_suspe.html

b. Avon, CT, 6/26/15 (79mi. away): http://www.courant.com/breaking-news/hc-avon-runner-sexual-assault-investigation-0626-2-20150625-story.html

I posted in thread #2 about these a couple of times, but there has really not been much traction.

 

[ThinkHard]

No. I hadn't seen the Q&A session, but I think that reporter is asking the right questions.
Those Northborough attempted abductions seems way similar to VM's case (IMO).
Someone in thread #2 spotted the hood-up car in the police log as another similarity to that case (I agree).

Nearby attacks/attempted abductions:

a. Westborough/Northborough, MA, 6/23/16 (22mi. away): http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/men_try_to_abduct_women_in_sep.html
b. sketch of Northborough perp:http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/police_release_sketch_of_suspe.html

b. Avon, CT, 6/26/15 (79mi. away): http://www.courant.com/breaking-news/hc-avon-runner-sexual-assault-investigation-0626-2-20150625-story.html

I posted in thread #2 about these a couple of times, but there has really not been much traction.

While these certainly don't rule out a possible connection, here are some things to maybe take into consideration. The towns are 30-40 minutes driving time apart. And they are also quite different towns in terms of traffic, business's, population. Westborough and northborough are also easily accessible by two major highways, where as Princeton is a distance from even a minor highway.

 

[Crimeblocker]

These are some things that stuck out to me from the Princeton Police Log:

Sunday August 7

8:45 p.m. Caller reports person in pickup truck stopped
and inquired about missing female, Mountain Rd.

10:43 p.m. Caller reports something in the woods, Sam
Cobb Lane

Princeton Police responded to two burglar alarms
Editor’s note: Logs are complete as given to the paper. A
call regarding a missing jogger on Aug. 7 did not appear in
the Princeton Police logs given to The Landmark.

Monday, August 8
4:24 p.m. Caller reports suspicious male in pickup truck
came to house to talk about what was going on in the woods

4:57 p.m. Caller reports seeing female walking on Brooks
Station Rd. between 1:20 and 1:25 p.m.

5:07 p.m. Caller reports seeing a vehicle parked beside Brooks Station Rd. with its hood up, male outside vehicle.

6:41 p.m. Caller reports seeing pickup going slow on Brooks
Station Rd. around 1:15 p.m.

9:56 p.m. Caller reports seeing female jogging on Brooks
Station Rd. in the afternoon.


Tuesday, August 9h
5:49 a.m. Caller reports seeing a white vehicle parked on side
of Brooks Station Rd. on Sunday around 3 p.m.

6:53 a.m. Caller reports seeing a vehicle parked in the woods,
male occupant, Ball Hill Rd.

7:30 p.m. Caller reports finding a Cricket cell phone,
Westminster Rd. & Mountain Rd.

3:18 p.m. Caller reports that while running down Boylston/
Radford Rd. earlier this summer, she noticed a white truck slow down and watch her while she ran

Is it it the Pick Up Truck Tips that prompted the POI visit by LE ? Seems to those tips alone would instigate vehicle checks on all White Pick Ups ( that would mean Ford,Dodge,GMC,Toyota just to name a few) registered in MA and NH. These are the investigative strategies that are incredibly time consuming. I still believe the perp is familiar with the town of Princeton but this guy may have been cruising these streets for awhile. Planning a strategy but more importantly gearing up for the attack, his first attack ?

 

[FindHG]

No. I hadn't seen the Q&A session, but I think that reporter is asking the right questions.
Those Northborough attempted abductions seems way similar to VM's case (IMO).
Someone in thread #2 spotted the hood-up car in the police log as another similarity to that case (I agree).

Nearby attacks/attempted abductions:

a. Westborough/Northborough, MA, 6/23/16 (22mi. away): http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/men_try_to_abduct_women_in_sep.html
b. sketch of Northborough perp:http://www.masslive.com/news/worcester/index.ssf/2016/06/police_release_sketch_of_suspe.html

b. Avon, CT, 6/26/15 (79mi. away): http://www.courant.com/breaking-news/hc-avon-runner-sexual-assault-investigation-0626-2-20150625-story.html

I posted in thread #2 about these a couple of times, but there has really not been much traction.

Thank you, twbcpa89.

http://www.courant.com/breaking-new...ault-investigation-0626-2-20150625-story.html

"The woman described the man as white, about 5-feet, 6-inches tall, with a goatee, sunglasses, wearing a black shirt with a reflective vest over the shirt and a baseball cap."

Interesting, thank you, twbscpa89. Could the vest have been a disguise of sorts? Why would a rapist want to stand out? There may be DNA evidence from that incident to compare.

With the Northborough pair, maybe having two of them doesn't fit in Vanessa's case because she fought back, which would may have been less possible it there were two of them.

 

[FindHG]

She took the train back and forth to NYC. Which train would that be? Could it have been somebody who had noticed her from the train either way, tracked her down and planned this? Sorry if this has come up before.

 

[ThinkHard]

She took the train back and forth to NYC. Which train would that be? Could it have been somebody who had noticed her from the train either way, tracked her down and planned this? Sorry if this has come up before.

She took the bus not the train, that Sunday she had a 430 pm bus ticket home departing out of Worcester.

Either way though it would still be hard to track someone to Princeton on either. The closest Amtrak stations are Hartford and Providence. There is one in Worcester but no NYC trains go direct to Worcester, you'd have to switch trains in Boston first and that would take you almost 5 hours to get home cause you loop around. Most people coming to that area from NYC via Amtrak though would go to Hartford as it's an hour drive to central MA.

The bus station (which is at the Worcester train station) is still a half hour drive to Princeton, and there is no public transportation from Worcester to Princeton.

So either way it would be really hard for someone to follow her home either by way of train or bus because her home would take a minimum of a half hour drive via private car to get there and there isn't even a place to rent cars at the Worcester train station.

 

[ThinkHard]

Is it it the Pick Up Truck Tips that prompted the POI visit by LE ? Seems to those tips alone would instigate vehicle checks on all White Pick Ups ( that would mean Ford,Dodge,GMC,Toyota just to name a few) registered in MA and NH. These are the investigative strategies that are incredibly time consuming. I still believe the perp is familiar with the town of Princeton but this guy may have been cruising these streets for awhile. Planning a strategy but more importantly gearing up for the attack, his first attack ?

I'm not sure one would just be cruising those streets. It would be kind of a random spot to pick as well as its fairly close to the town center. It seems to me if someone was going to cruise country roads for a random runner they would have lots and lots of better more removed places to cruise. Princeton also isn't near any highways. So it would be a weird place to just randomly pick off a map to cruise (no easy get away points). I would think the Princeton would have to be quite familiar to this person in the first place. Perhaps not because they lived in town but it could be because they drove through it regularly or found themselves there regularly for work.

 

[ThinkHard]

This article was on the landmark last week and gives a good sense of the community in which this crime took place:

http://www.thelandmark.com/news/2016-08-18/Editorials_(and)__Opinions/Room_to_grieve.html

 

[ThinkHard]

This is the most recent article I've found, also worth reading:

http://www.sentinelandenterprise.co...rder-three-weeks-ago-princeton-residents-feel

 

[FindHG]

I'm not sure one would just be cruising those streets. It would be kind of a random spot to pick as well as its fairly close to the town center. It seems to me if someone was going to cruise country roads for a random runner they would have lots and lots of better more removed places to cruise. Princeton also isn't near any highways. So it would be a weird place to just randomly pick off a map to cruise (no easy get away points). I would think the Princeton would have to be quite familiar to this person in the first place. Perhaps not because they lived in town but it could be because they drove through it regularly or found themselves there regularly for work.

Agreed.

She took the bus not the train, that Sunday she had a 430 pm bus ticket home departing out of Worcester.

Either way though it would still be hard to track someone to Princeton on either. The closest Amtrak stations are Hartford and Providence. There is one in Worcester but no NYC trains go direct to Worcester, you'd have to switch trains in Boston first and that would take you almost 5 hours to get home cause you loop around. Most people coming to that area from NYC via Amtrak though would go to Hartford as it's an hour drive to central MA.

The bus station (which is at the Worcester train station) is still a half hour drive to Princeton, and there is no public transportation from Worcester to Princeton.

So either way it would be really hard for someone to follow her home either by way of train or bus because her home would take a minimum of a half hour drive via private car to get there and there isn't even a place to rent cars at the Worcester train station.

Thank you, ThinkHard. It's great of you to take the time. I've been cruising the street views of the area for hours. This spot stands out in so many ways. The freak who did this may have taken a lot of time to select it. As has been noted upthread, there's a clear view of the road either way. Then there's the incline, where I have the arrow. A person could have hidden there and had that clear view without being exposed. A runner approaching could be caught off guard, then dragged away unseen. Could he have lurked there Sunday after Sunday for the perfect timing? If he had, how would he have avoided being noticed before?



He could have walked through the woods and had access to any number of parking lots on Worcester Rd or the Bible camp and gotten away completely unseen, which he seems to have. I keep thinking that he never risked being seen in a car in that area that day, if he had before. This could to be somebody who observed the route of Vanessa's jog and picked this spot and that day because he had the patience to wait for the perfect time.

 

[Paulclapper]

Last week I posted the rumor going around that the case was essentially solved. Today I talked to a women from the community who is friends with policemen who have asserted that the rumor was false. It seems like a few poi' have come and gone.

 

[Madeleine74]

Last week I posted the rumor going around that the case was essentially solved. Today I talked to a women from the community who is friends with policemen who have asserted that the rumor was false. It seems like a few poi' have come and gone.

I thought this would be the outcome. Rumors get started easier than wildfires in the west during a drought.

 

[marble]

In the Sarah Fox Murder investigation (see article), DNA found on a chain during occupy-wallstreet protests, 8 years after her murder, was matched her possible killer using CODIS.

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Sarah-Fox-Murder-Mystery-DNA-Linked-Occupy-Wall-Street-Subway-Gates-161989375.html

If LE could recover DNA from a chain, they can recover it from a bike; and, unless it's pink or something, its not that suspicious to have a bike in your garage.

HOLD UP!

They could probably pull DNA from the bike handles. However, a point of clarification about that OWS/Murder link that wasn't----- Police recovered DNA from a chain used to lock up a subway turnstile (a very large heavy chain) but it didn't belong to an Occupy Wall Street Protester, and the matching DNA from Sarah Fox wasn't from the person who killed her.

Nope, the NYPD forensics department completely contaminated the evidence and the DNA on both the chain and in Sarah Fox's case both came from A Lab Tech who had contaminated evidence. (This does not make me feel confident in the forensics lab in NYC by any stretch).

here: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york...-sloppy-city-worker-sources-article-1.1112436

 

[Paulclapper]

I think the spot is key. I drove by it again a few days ago and I was behind another car and I had one behind me, several drove by me going the other way. The point is, while it is not a busy street, it's not completely free of traffic. Someone pointed out though that at that spot you can see both ways pretty far to make sure at the moment of the abduction their was no cars coming. This spot also allowed easy access deeper into the woods. Their are houses pretty close to the spot, I assume the killer new they were empty. I would be shocked if it doesn't turn out to be a neighbor or someone comfortable with that area.

 

[FindHG]

I think the spot is key. I drove by it again a few days ago and I was behind another car and I had one behind me, several drove by me going the other way. The point is, while it is not a busy street, it's not completely free of traffic. Someone pointed out though that at that spot you can see both ways pretty far to make sure at the moment of the abduction their was no cars coming. This spot also allowed easy access deeper into the woods. Their are houses pretty close to the spot, I assume the killer new they were empty. I would be shocked if it doesn't turn out to be a neighbor or someone comfortable with that area.

I'm not able to upload the screenshot of the view, but I agree. This should give you an overview. It seems to be somebody who knew the area, the patterns, how not to leave tracks, whether local or not, it would have taken time to plan. They should be asking people if they ran into any hikers or unfamiliar individuals in the woods between Brooks Station and Worcester going back months if not weeks, especially on Sundays. For some reason the whole car sighting thing doesn't make sense to me. This seems too well planned for the perp's car to have been seen on that road between 1 and 3 pm, unless they have tracks in the crime scene area. If LE had any tire tracks, then the size of the car at least would be easier to guess, but they haven't been specific about it. If she started her jog circuit at 1 pm, then the 2:45 ping of her phone could have been from when the perp walked through the woods and away toward Worcester Rd. Could dogs pick up his scent from the potential hiding spot?