As recently as yesterday, I was strongly considering the possibility that the lies and half-truths in this case all stemmed simply from Maura's family wanting her to be viewed as a missing person rather than a fugitive. Mulling this for the past day led me to reread Fred's police statement.
Fred Murray's statement to UMass police is inconsistent to say the least. He starts in talking about the car shopping, "We went to a place in Northampton that her boyfriend had good luck with." Who, Billy? Billy in Oklahoma? Billy who went to school at West Point, in New York? Fred knows that Billy is her boyfriend. He says they were going to get married. Maura sometimes stayed at Billy's mother's house over breaks. Where did he think she was on school holidays? Are we supposed to believe Billy just up and bought a car while visiting Maura on leave over a thousand miles from home? Or just happened into a Northampton car dealership on a scenic autumn day?
"Started to get dark. Came back to the Quality Inn (?) Hung around there for awhile. She exercised at the weight room." That makes sense, right? I always bring my workout clothes car shopping, because you never know when your dad is going to invite you to work out at the Quality Inn. Hope you brought a change of clothes for your imaginary dinner.
"We went to the ABC and had supper there. She got a call from Kate who had just returned from a track meet." Why on earth would anybody care where Kate came from? That is completely extraneous information that is designed to explain where Kate was and why they went to get her. "We went to a student parking lot and picked up Kate around 9:00." If Kate just came back from a track meet, shouldn't she have been on a bus? So is he saying they were meeting her at her car? Or that they just randomly chose the student lot as a meeting place? Makes sense, since there are only about a thousand better places to do that. It's also strange that he tells us what time he picked up Kate. It is the only event that night for which he provides a specific time, making this seem like a sensitive issue for him.
"I asked Maura to take me back to the Quality Inn. She instead had me pick up Kate and we went back to ABC to the upstairs." Okay, so who is driving here? Fred asking Maura to take him to the motel presumes she is driving. Maura having Fred pick up Kate presumes Fred is driving. Regardless, why tell us that he wanted to go back to the Quality Inn? This is more extraneous information. This statement isn't even a page long. Why waste a breath telling us that you didn't want to go to ABC when your daughter is missing and this is the only police department to whom you will give an interview? This makes it seem like he is trying to absolve himself of responsibility for something.
"I had two beers, Kate had a couple of beers, Maura had one drink (believe to be a black russian)." Fred had two beers, but Kate had a couple. These two words mean the same thing. He unexpectedly changes the language he uses to describe the same circumstance, without explanation. This is suspicious.
"I asked to be brought back to the Quality Inn." Seriously, again with this? Note he doesn't tell us that he was brought back to the Quality Inn, just that he asked.
"They were going back to the dorm. I said it was too late but they said it doesn't get started until late." So Fred told them it was too late to go back to the dorm? Surely that was the plan the entire time, the alternative being that Fred, Kate and Maura all sleep in Fred's motel room. Regardless of the girls' plans to party, a trip back to the dorms would still be necessary to return Kate to campus. It makes no sense for Fred to have told them that it was too late to return to the dorms. That was clearly the plan all along anyway.
"Maura was in bed when I woke up around 10:00 a.m. Maura woke around 10:30. She told me about the accident." Is that so? I remember when she was the one who woke him up. Sunday morning, uh, Maura woke me up. She, uh, she had come back, you know, uh, during the night,and uh, told me that shed had an accident in my car (5:14 in the Disappeared broadcast, available on Youtube). So did she wake him up or was she still asleep when he woke in the morning? Why did she have a key card? How did she get into his hotel room without waking him, if his UMPD statement is true. She made three phone calls from his cell phone. Did she stay in his room while she called? Or open and close the door again to go into the hall? Neither of these things woke him up?
Then Fred talks and talks and talks about the insurance claim. Didn't know if he had insurance for her, tried to get a free loaner, rental cars, talking to the concierge, looking for a Toyota place. This patently useless information comprises almost 50% of the only statement Fred Murray ever gave to police about his daughter's disappearance. In this interview, this insurance claim is the only thing that is on Fred Murray's mind.
"I called Maura on Sunday around 8:30 or 9:00 about insurance and getting reports at police department. I was sure she would call because she wouldn't let me down again." So she crashed his car, promises she will call him about insurance and then doesn't? And he doesn't try to call her? As a parent, wouldn't you be angry? He is expecting a call from his daughter that never comes, and the last time he saw her she was "whimpering in the car." As a parent, wouldn't you be concerned? Wouldn't you call?
At the end of his statement, police asked Fred Murray "Did you go to Liquors 44 with the girls? At first he stated no, then he thought about it and said 'I am unsure if I did if it was before or after ABC. I think it was after ABC. I can remember the girls walking around looking for wine and telling them to just pick something.'" His first response is a denial that he went to Liquors 44. Next, he says I am unsure if I did if it was before or after ABC. Now he doesn't know whether or not he went to Liquors 44, and if he did, he doesn't know when. But he can remember the girls walking around picking out wine. If he can remember that, shouldn't he be sure that he went to Liquors 44? Regardless, why is this such a vague memory for him? Isn't this the last night he ever saw his daughter alive? He doesn't want to admit that they went to Liquors 44 because it suggests that they drank more alcohol that night than the drinks they consumed at ABC.
Consider how much more reasonable this scenario is than the one that Fred offered:
Instead of Maura and Fred eating dinner at the ABC, then picking Kate up in a student lot, then returning to ABC for drinks, the three of them are drinking at the ABC (or somewhere else) for most of the night. Either before or after ABC, they go to Liquors 44 and purchase alcohol.
Then Fred drives the girls back to the dorm. This makes so much more sense. First of all, the girls had obviously always planned to return to the dorm. The only alternative was for both of them to sleep in Fred's motel room. The reason that Fred offered for their return was that they wanted to party. He clearly insinuates this when he claims that they told him "it doesn't get started until late." This is the dorm room party where nobody remembers a single guest. Think about that. This isn't a house party or a frat party. This alleged party happened in a dorm room. How do you find yourself inside your dorm room with strangers? If you did indeed invite strangers into your dorm room, wouldn't finding out their names be the first thing you did? This party never happened. Fred simply dropped the girls off at the dorm after a night of drinking, like they had planned from the beginning of the night.
Then Fred drives back to his hotel room. For years we have been speculating about what would make Maura leave her dorm room in the middle of the night, after she had been drinking, to drive to her father's hotel room. We wonder about this because this is a very, very suspicious story. Maura goes to a party with some invisible guests, then leaves for her father's motel. It makes much more sense that Fred would drop off the girls, and then drive back to the motel himself. And I think this is exactly what happened.
Fred crashed the Corolla on his way back to the motel. He was drunk, and worried not only about a DUI arrest (we should check to see if he has a prior one), but that he would be on the hook for $8,000 in damages to his car, since insurance won't pay out in a DUI accident. He would also have to consider the possible ramifications of a DUI arrest on his job. He called Maura, who he knew was more sober. Maura went to the scene of the accident. It is one mile from her dorm room, and her building is visible from the crash site. She wouldn't even have to drive, she could have gotten there on foot in under ten minutes. Fred left Maura there to take responsibility for the crash, perhaps telling her that if he was arrested for DUI, he would lose his job and have to pay for the damage to the car himself. There wouldn't be enough money left for school.
Fred could have driven Maura's Saturn from the scene, or she could have given him her keys and he could have walked less than a mile to Lot 22, where there is almost no doubt she would have been mandated to park as a resident of the southwest dorm clusters. Maura got a ride to the motel with the tow truck driver. It makes sense that Fred took the Saturn to the motel. For all of the questions he claimed to have asked the concierge about finding a rental car, he never claimed that he asked her for a place that will deliver a rental car. Perhaps he found one that did, but it seems like they drove to the rental place. That would make sense if the Saturn were at the motel.
This explains why he did not call Maura to pressure her about the accident report. It explains the mysterious party with no guests. It explains why Maura would leave her dorm in the middle of the night to go to her father's hotel room (she wouldn't). It explains why Fred told two different stories about whether Maura was asleep when he woke up or if she was the one who woke him up. It explains why he lied about going to Liquors 44. It explains why Fred would help her leave the state. It explains why he was so deceptive in his statement to UMPD, and why he refused to sit down with other investigators for two years (and showed up with two lawyers). It explains why Fred says things like "nothing that happened before the crash matters" and "her plans changed'' and why the family has spent so much time trying to derail any investigation into what happened before the New Hampshire accident. It explains the palpable guilt we feel from Fred Murray, guilt that has been attributed to unsubstantiated things like how hard he was on her or that he may have abused her.
I think that Law Enforcement knows this. I think Fred Murray knows that they know this. It explains why LE stated in court testimony that they had leads, and that there was a high probability of this case resulting in charges. I think this is why Fred Murray so badly wanted to know what Law Enforcement knew, and why private investigators stop working with him. It explains why the Hadley police report has never been released.
I think there is a serious likelihood that Fred Murray crashed the Corolla.
Of course, this is just a theory, but in case anybody thinks it's unfair to accuse him of this, I will point out that I think his inconsistent statements regarding whether or not Maura was asleep when he woke up merit this suspicion in and of themselves. Inconsistencies like this can constitute probable cause for arrest. I would be incredibly dubious about getting two different stories from any person remotely associated with a crime or disappearance. It is a huge red flag and a cause for alarm.
