MI MI - Charles Rutherford, 34, & Lana Stempien (fd dec.), Aug 2005 - Detroit Boaters

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I knew Lana since childhood. I have also been waiting and checking on news on that body found last year. I do believe it was Chuck. Something is fishy here....someone is keeping this under wraps on purpose (IMO). I always wonder if there is a connection to Kwame Kilpatrick, Detroit's disgraced mayor, who Lana was investigating at the time of her death....
 
Only4Justice said:
I knew Lana since childhood. I have also been waiting and checking on news on that body found last year. I do believe it was Chuck. Something is fishy here....someone is keeping this under wraps on purpose (IMO). I always wonder if there is a connection to Kwame Kilpatrick, Detroit's disgraced mayor, who Lana was investigating at the time of her death....
Click to expand...

Concerning the possibility that information about the body might be deliberately withheld, could the cause of death be something suspicious, like a bullet wound, or maybe there is evidence of blunt force trauma?
Something happened that day, I have just never been convinced that it was an accident. They were nearing their destination, the day was chilly, why would they go for a swim? They were on the verge of breaking up, could they have gotten into a fight? Or could someone have wanted them out of the way?
 
This episode just aired again on ID.

My first question was that they made reference to how rough the waters were. I don't know much about boats and boating, but is it at all possible they were ejected from the boat? Why does it have to be a swim?

The blue fenders...that was the most compelling thing to me. Now, add that to the "boat speeding out of the harbor" and if that lead is at all viable--it does make me wonder. I kind of left the special thinking that the Stimpiens were grieving and in denial, but the more I think and read, the more I just think this is so odd.
 
Does anyone know if the boyfriend's body has ever been found?

This case is simply baffling.

I hope their families get some closure.
 
As many of you may know, on or about Memorial Day of 2008, partial human remains were found adjacent to the shoreline of Lake Huron, not distant from the location where Lana was found in 2005. To date, no identification of the 2008 remains has been made public. "Budget cuts" and re-examination of defective evidence from the discredited Detroit crime lab have been offered as reasons for the delay.

I continue to pray for resolution of Lana's case.
 
BrianG, I pray for a resolution soon.
 
To All,

It was four years ago today that Lana died.

I continue to work, and to pray, for resolution.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lana_Stempien

Lana Stempien (1969 -- August 11, 2005) was an American lawyer, licensed to practice in Michigan and Florida, who drowned under mysterious circumstances. Her boyfriend Charles Rutherford Jr. (born 1970, presumed missing August 11, 2005, declared legally dead August 3, 2006), commonly known as Chuck Rutherford, was also on the boat when Stempien went into the water. He was ruled dead by a court of law in 2006, but his body was never found.


This is a very interesting case. My first inclination is that the BF killed her. How far from any shore were they and were either or both strong swimmers?
 
The wikipedia entry ends with:

Authorities have not found Rutherford's body despite repeatedly searching Lake Huron.[1] Investigators also found no activity on any of Rutherford's bank or email accounts after his disappearance.[1] They have ruled his death as an accidental drowning.[1] Less than a year after his disappearance, Rutherford's parents went to court in an attempt to have him declared legally dead. Normally, an individual has to be missing for five years to officially be considered dead in Michigan. In court proceedings attended by relatives of Stempien, who feel Rutherford is alive and may have murdered Stempien,[1] and Rutherford's parents, Rutherford's status was debated. The sole witness was a State of Michigan Police Detective who stated that their investigation determined Rutherford was dead. On August 3, 2006, the court declared Chuck Rutherford legally dead.[5]


On May 28, 2008, The Detroit News reported that human remains were found near the Lake Huron shoreline, and near the Cheboygan and Presque Isle county line. The remains were taken to Grand Rapids for identification.[6]

They must have been the remains of someone else.
 
It is over a year later and the remains have still not been identified? If they were Rutherford's I would think by now through DNA or dental records they could have positively ID'd it by now. Jeez, what is the hold up?
 
It would seem the family could have paid to have one done privately. Unless they don't want to. Or is it because it's still under investigation they can't?
 
grace60 said:
It would seem the family could have paid to have one done privately. Unless they don't want to. Or is it because it's still under investigation they can't?
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It's been sixteen months since the as yet unidentified remains were found.

As to a private party paying for the identification, until the remains are identified, the family's (or any third party's) standing in the case could not be established, a genuine "Catch 22".
 
DNA Results in on Missing Boater

(WXYZ) - Two families who had been hoping for closure in a boating mystery are still facing uncertainty.

Police have never solved the mystery of what happened out on Lake Huron to two lawyers from Grosse Pointe Farms.

So when human remains were discovered last spring along the coast – many people wondered if they might belong to Chuck Rutherford Jr.

Today we learned – they do not. And now police have a new mystery on their hands.

http://tinyurl.com/yzwzdmg
 
Thx for the update. It took long enough to get the DNA results back, good grief.

So now we have a new mystery - if this isn't Rutherford then who is it? I was almost convinced it was going to be Rutherford.
 
Elf8702 said:
DNA Results in on Missing Boater

(WXYZ) - Two families who had been hoping for closure in a boating mystery are still facing uncertainty.

Police have never solved the mystery of what happened out on Lake Huron to two lawyers from Grosse Pointe Farms.

So when human remains were discovered last spring along the coast – many people wondered if they might belong to Chuck Rutherford Jr.

Today we learned – they do not. And now police have a new mystery on their hands.

http://tinyurl.com/yzwzdmg
Click to expand...

I saw the "48 Hours" show on this story and that Rutherford set off my hinky meter. There was something about the look in his eyes. I am sure he is alive somewhere and that he killed Lana.
 
After reading this entire thread, here is my theory:

I don't think that Charles Rutherford is alive, and I do think he is responsible for Lana's death.
It's pretty obvious that he was an abuser and came close to killing Lana in the past.
I think that the knob got stuck in Lana's shoe as she was trying to scramble on top of the boat and stomped down on the knob, possibly also slicing the back of her shoe as she slid.

I think that Charles Rutherford was struggling with her, trying to either beat her or throw her overboard, and either she went overboard first (whether due to slipping off the boat or being thrown off by her boyfriend) or he grabbed her and threw himself overboard on purpose while dragging her with him.

If it was the former, in his drunken, enraged, irrational state (a state documented previously by the eyewitness to him beating her in an earlier event) he either stayed on the boat for a while and taunted her while she tried to climb back on, eventually driving the boat away from her and drowning himself later, or else he dove in after her without a life jacket, ladder, or floatation device. -Again, the fact that someone had seen him once drive into a parked car and keep driving in a rage even after his airbag had deployed leads me to believe that after finishing off a lot of vodka and working himself into a rage, he wouldn't be thinking clearly enough once Lana went into the water (no matter how she ended up there) to rescue her properly.

I think he must have drowned not long after regardless of which possible scenario took place, because there just doesn't appear to be a way he could have made it back to shore and disappeared without help, both at the time and later financially, and I just don't see as having been planned ahead of time.
 
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