GUILTY MT - Sherry Arnold, 43, Sidney, 7 Jan 2012 - #3

[liltexans]

The more I read about Spell, the more I get the feeling there is something really "off" about him. I just hope his lawyers don't try to claim insanity or some other mental defect. I grew up in a Midwestern town that was even smaller than Sidney is and we all knew about the strange high school drop out type of adults who hung around just a little too much with the middle and high school kids downtown. The type who seem too interested in being around kids and who buy them beer, drugs, etc. Fortunately the ones I was aware of in my town were mostly harmless overall and no one was ever kidnapped or murdered by one of them, but this Spell guy really reminds me of that.

Spell was arrested again in 2009 after authorities said he asked a middle-school student in Battlement Mesa to text other students and ask them if they wanted to buy pot. An arrest affidavit said the student, then 14, said Spell had provided him with marijuana.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/01/19/national/a165128S35.DTL

 

[IHAVENOCLUE]

Nah, the problem is when someone gets between the pothead and the food.

:floorlaugh::floorlaugh::floorlaugh:

O/T...But there was a person I knew in college who after...ahem..."conducting an experiment on the effects of cannabis sativa".....found himself in a foodless apartment, so he made a coffee ground sandwich...and ate it!:crazy:

 

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

Someone heading to Williston to look for work would be likely to head straight through Sidney on 200. They would not have much of a legitimate reason to be out on the east side of town by the beet plant very early on a Saturday morning. That is not on the way to anywhere.

 

[IHAVENOCLUE]

OOPS here is the link for that>
http://www.willistonherald.com/news...-a61e-001871e3ce6c.html#.TxdBbd3I7nc.facebook

Since I am not at all an expert on legalities...could Waters and Spell be tried in Montana for kidnapping, and North Dakota for Sherry's death?
In other words, can they be tried in the states where different aspects of the crime took place?
I am hoping for this so that they can still get a stiff penalty in Montana for the kidnapping, even if the penalties in North Dakota are "lighter"?

 

[NEMT]

Approximately 760 miles from Parachute to Sidney, they didn't have much time to sleep, might have been "speeding".

 

[IHAVENOCLUE]

I really really really don't believe this was an accident.. I heard some information that unfortunately I can't prove is 100% reliable so I'm not comfortable sharing... but it sounded plausible.

But I am not looking forward to the news coming out. I do think this was a case of just some really horrible individuals who set out to do something terrible.

And...the report that Spell's psych evals changed the outcome of his prior case...I wonder if he has some pre-existing psychological issues..anger, ODD, or PTSD, etc. And will he try to use the insanity "card"?

 

[liltexans]

Oh brother, cue the violins...Spell's family is speaking to the press again...

Spell's father, Harry, and mother, Tina, spoke Thursday afternoon, and said that, "Michael is a good kid that got mixed up in the wrong crowd," and that "he wouldn't hurt anyone."

http://www.krextv.com/news/around-t...-As-Extradition-Process-Begins-137720623.html

 

[Noway]

I'm not sure this makes any sense but ... I wonder what the gas situation was in the 1992 Ford Explorer. Source

They would have to fuel up a couple of times just to get to Sidney. Could LE determine where they got gas, and based on the amount of gas in the Explorer, figure how many more miles they put on the vehicle after they last got gas? I guess that would have to mean that Waters wasn't driving around Williston ... grasping at straws here I guess. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr at myself.

Distance 756 miles; tank holds 19.3 gallons. Source

The 1992 Explorer gets between 18-20 miles per gallon (depending on 2WD or 4WD and normal variance). Source

 

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

Since I am not at all an expert on legalities...could Waters and Spell be tried in Montana for kidnapping, and North Dakota for Sherry's death?
In other words, can they be tried in the states where different aspects of the crime took place?
I am hoping for this so that they can still get a stiff penalty in Montana for the kidnapping, even if the penalties in North Dakota are "lighter"?

The most they could get here in North Dakota is life, no matter what they did. However in Montana Aggravated Kidnapping is a Capitol offense. The other option is to make it Federal if she was kidnapped in Montana and killed in North Dakota.

 

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

I'm not sure this makes any sense but ... I wonder what the gas situation was in the 1992 Ford Explorer. Source

They would have to fuel up a couple of times just to get to Sidney. Could LE determine where they got gas, and based on the amount of gas in the Explorer, figure how many more miles they put on the vehicle after they last got gas? I guess that would have to mean that Waters wasn't driving around Williston ... grasping at straws here I guess. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr at myself.

Distance 756 miles; tank holds 19.3 gallons. Source

The 1992 Explorer gets between 18-20 miles per gallon (depending on 2WD or 4WD and normal variance). Source

Most Explorers are lucky to get 15 mpg, mileage will be less in cold weather and driving at high speeds. I keep a book in all my vehicles and record the miles, gallons, and mpg every time I fill gas but very few people are that OCD about keeping track if their mileage. However they may have left receipts in the vehicle. That could show where they bought gas and how much they bought.

But LE is asking us to check our land over quite a large area of western ND and eastern MT. So I suspect they have no idea how many miles these guys drove.

 

[Indy Anna]

Oh brother, cue the violins...Spell's family is speaking to the press again...

Spell's father, Harry, and mother, Tina, spoke Thursday afternoon, and said that, "Michael is a good kid that got mixed up in the wrong crowd," and that "he wouldn't hurt anyone."

http://www.krextv.com/news/around-t...-As-Extradition-Process-Begins-137720623.html

How do they know the other kids in the crowd didn't get mixed up with the wrong guy (their son). That sounds more accurate considering Spell was supplying middle school kids with drugs and alcohol.

 

[Jacie Estes]

Oh brother, cue the violins...Spell's family is speaking to the press again...

Spell's father, Harry, and mother, Tina, spoke Thursday afternoon, and said that, "Michael is a good kid that got mixed up in the wrong crowd," and that "he wouldn't hurt anyone."

http://www.krextv.com/news/around-t...-As-Extradition-Process-Begins-137720623.html

Umm, Mrs. Spell; apparently your son would hurt somebody. There are two people sitting in jail, he is one of them. He needs to tell where Sherry is located.

 

[GrainneDhu]

When someone hits a pedestrian they will generally break hard before impact if they see the person before hitting. If they hit someone without seeing them beforehand they either don't stop at all or break hard to a stop. Even if they are not terribly concerned about the victim, people tend to want to check their vehicle for damage. If they hit her then picked her up there would probably be break marks on the road giving LE some indication as to how it went down.

I agree with this with one exception: even a relatively low speed (5 mph) collision can kill a pedestrian if the pedestrian falls in a bad position. Braking hard from 5 mph doesn't necessarily leave brake marks.

I am inferring that there were no significant brake marks on the road since LE hung onto the possibility that she had walked away in a daze even after her shoe was found.

I just had a chilling thought, though. I speculate that if there were a higher speed collision because the driver didn't notice her, there may not have been any hard braking involved. The first reaction may have been "get away!"

And then, within a few seconds or minutes, either the driver or passenger decides to go back to see what had happened. At that point, the braking is normal (no marks). They stop, realise she's badly injured (or dead), panic takes over again, they grab her body and take off.

The whole thing could take less than 5 minutes and, in such a small town, it's very possible no one went by the scene of the collision in that time. It was still fully dark out, early Saturday morning so no usual business traffic.

 

[GrainneDhu]

And...the report that Spell's psych evals changed the outcome of his prior case...I wonder if he has some pre-existing psychological issues..anger, ODD, or PTSD, etc. And will he try to use the insanity "card"?

Considering the nature of the charges that were dropped and the current charges, I've been wondering if he has some sort of intellectual impairment.

 

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

Williston is my home town and when we were kids we used to drive to Sidney to get our beer (MT had 18 year old drinking). We would take the back roads on the way home, or have a kegger somewhere out in the bottom lands along the Yellowstone or Missouri. It was (and still is) such a maze of tree lines and trails that no one would find us. After I grew up I spent some time working as a deputy for the sheriff's department. I thought I knew the area like the back of my hand, but going out at night to answer a call or bust a party was a nightmare.

Take a look at Noway's map of the area. Click on the satellite view of the map and zoom in for a close look at the river valley between Sidney and Williston. The roads and tree rows are laid out like a Jackson Pollock painting. Once you leave the valley the landscape consists of endless hills and valleys with oil service roads going every direction.

It's easy to see that once someone leaves the highway it would be very easy to bury a body and never be able to find their way back even if they wanted to, and why a search of the five county region would be almost impossible.

 

[wfgodot]

o/t, but, Eoanthropus Dawsoni, the Latin name for Piltdown Man's an interesting choice of handle.

 

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

o/t, but, Eoanthropus Dawsoni, the Latin name for Piltdown Man's an interesting choice of handle.

Years ago I used to be busy on a few anthropology boards and used that for a user name. LOL

 

[GrainneDhu]

Williston is my home town and when we were kids we used to drive to Sidney to get our beer (MT had 18 year old drinking). We would take the back roads on the way home, or have a kegger somewhere out in the bottom lands along the Yellowstone or Missouri. It was (and still is) such a maze of tree lines and trails that no one would find us. After I grew up I spent some time working as a deputy for the sheriff's department. I thought I knew the area like the back of my hand, but going out at night to answer a call or bust a party was a nightmare.

Take a look at Noway's map of the area. Click on the satellite view of the map and zoom in for a close look at the river valley between Sidney and Williston. The roads and tree rows are laid out like a Jackson Pollock painting. Once you leave the valley the landscape consists of endless hills and valleys with oil service roads going every direction.

It's easy to see that once someone leaves the highway it would be very easy to bury a body and never be able to find their way back even if they wanted to, and why a search of the five county region would be almost impossible.

I agree totally.

Iowa is nowhere near as vast as the area in question but it is rural and does have a Jeffersonian grid road system. About 10 years ago, I had a dog with cancer that required chemo at the vet school teaching hospital about 45 miles away on a diagonal line as the crow flies. To make the drive less boring, I decided to choose a different route every single time I went to the hospital.

Sometimes I'd take every third left and every third right. Sometimes I'd take any left or right that I saw a certain colour near. I got to see a lot of land and I never got lost although a lot of times, I could not have told you how I got where I was or where it was that I had driven.

North Dakota, especially, seems to me to be similar but on a much larger scale.

I've also found on other forums that many people who have lived in heavily urbanised areas really don't share the same concept of distance that I have. To many people, the idea of driving 30 miles to see a concert seems like a long drive. To me, anything under 350 miles away is a day trip and heck YEAH I'd drive that far to see a band I liked (or performance--I drove to Chicago and back in one day to see Mikhail Baryshnikov and Gelsey Kirkland).

 

[Jacie Estes]

Years ago I used to be busy on a few anthropology boards and used that for a user name. LOL

OT Thank you so much for the link in your signature; Annie Mae and Ray should never be forgotten. There is a book called Who Would Unbraid her hair: the legend of annie mae by antoinette nora claypoole, powerful read. I have offered tobacco at The Wounded Knee Monument for Annie Mae. Warrior Woman.

 

[MsFacetious]

I think that once again, the media is ASSuming a murder because they say she is dead.
Just like I think the media is ASSuming this couldn't have started as a hit and run... because of the charges.

Unless I missed LE saying "This was not an accident that went bad, this was a murder from the very beginning."
I'm pretty sure I would have seen that though...

BBM
LE believes she was murdered.

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/police-sherry-arnold-murdered-15370265


Media call her death a murder.

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/murdered-montana-teacher-mystery-15365017