The Bloody Sock

[MeadowMuffin]

First post here on websleuths, but I've been following the case on other message boards over the years. I've been turning that sock over in my head trying to figure it out. It doesn't make sense at all. If you broke in to rob and it turned to a murder why take the sock. If Darlie (or Darin) planted it why take it that way, (and again why a sock? why not jewelry?)

So now my latest thought on the sock is that its not tied to the crime scene at all. I think the boy were slipping into the garage for a Popsicle and scratched themselves on the cat cage or got a little blood while playing. they go into the laundry room grab a sock and wipe it off. They think if mom sees it she'll be mad to they get rid of it. throw it at the neighbors garbage and there it is.​

This definitely could have happened. Now, was this part of the clean laundry that Babcia did that day? I ask because leg/arm hairs were found on it and also fibers from Darin's sneakers. If they were the socks he wore that day, there should have been some DNA from his skin on the sock, but all they found was Darlie's in the toe area. How would you account for Darlie's DNA in the toe area if the boys put their own blood on the sock? Also, BOTH boys would have had to cut themselves going in and out. I just now finished reading all the transcripts. Big job. I don't own any of the books, so maybe this is where my question is aimed. I've read a few times that Darlie and Darin were upset that they weren't told right away about the sock being found. What's the story on that if you know?

 

[tinyrip1]

I don't know at what point they find out about the sock. It's not in her arrest warrant, they were waiting on DNA before they knew it was from the house. So like maybe a month. I can't remember if i read anywhere that they were mad about not knowing about it right away. but they were probably mad they weren't told right away. The sock is Darin's. I think it would probably have been clean. I don't know how much laundry Darlie was doing, especially if she had help from Basia(sp?). but if Darlie was handling the laundry even just changing out loads, then that would explain her dna on the sock. Knowing how rough kids can play sometimes I don't think it would be far fetched to believe that the boys both got a little bloody doing something and found something to clean it up with before mom saw it

 

[cami]

I don't know at what point they find out about the sock. It's not in her arrest warrant, they were waiting on DNA before they knew it was from the house. So like maybe a month. I can't remember if i read anywhere that they were mad about not knowing about it right away. but they were probably mad they weren't told right away. The sock is Darin's. I think it would probably have been clean. I don't know how much laundry Darlie was doing, especially if she had help from Basia(sp?). but if Darlie was handling the laundry even just changing out loads, then that would explain her dna on the sock. Knowing how rough kids can play sometimes I don't think it would be far fetched to believe that the boys both got a little bloody doing something and found something to clean it up with before mom saw it

Darlie did not do the laundry that day. She hired Basia's mother Halina to do the laundry. Halina was in the home doing laundry on the day of the murders. The sock, according to both Darlie and Darin was an old holey sock of Darin's that was in the rag bin and used to polish the cars. All of this is in the trial transcripts. I believe Darlie put the sock in the alley that night for some reason she had to get rid of it or it was a plant to make authorities think there was an intruder. They sock was Y-STR DNA tested in 2015 and no u/k male DNA was found on it.

 

[fridaybaker]

Actually they admitted to dusting around the window and ALSO on the knifes. The knife could have easily been cross contaminated. Actually, there was a better chance of cross contamination than not.

The Blood Drops. The blood spatter analysis of today is much further along than that of 1995. The blood spatter we now know could have easily been caused during the time SHE was attacked. Tom Bevel has been discredited in his own profession several times. The Wrongful Conviction of Jason Payne / Tom Bevel's Credibility Questioned

I still don't know what the hell to believe. I just know its not a slam dunk like the prosecution wanted the jury to believe. I hope a real trial happens and we can know the truth.

Sorry for responding to such an old post. I'm just reading about this case now! I do have a question: LE said that they dusted around the window and the knives, which you claim could have cross contaminated the knife in question with fibers from the screen. However, didn't they test all the knives? Why would only that one have screen fibers on it?

Also, I'd love to know how this is handled in other cases. Is the "dusting" tool cleaned after each item dusted? If not, in reality, does the brush often cross contaminate other items?

My impression is this: The tool used to dust "around the windows" could certainly have picked up fibers from the screen and then transferred some of them to the next item dusted; however, it surely wouldn't transfer only to one knife? This is just too much of a coincidence for me. The screen was cut, not pushed in or out. It didn't seem to be an area where a person had climbed in or out of it. There was a knife with screen fibers located in the knife block that could easily have been used to cut the screen.

Add to this the lack of blood near the window, in the garage, on the floor of the utility room, outside the home, etc. and it's starting to look an awful lot like someone in the home used a knife in the block to cut the screen and then returned it to it's home in the block. Part of staging.

Then, continuing on the topic of entrance/exit of the house, you have the security light. Wouldn't it have been on if an intruder had run out of the garage? It was programmed to stay on for 18 minutes, and I believe that an officer was located a few blocks from the house and responded within a couple of minutes to the call. The security light wasn't on.

There are just so many, many things that point to no intruder. When taken altogether, they weave a pretty strong case for the murderer being one of the two adults living in the house.

 

[InstantProof]

I think she used the sock to try to give an excuse as to why there would be no fingerprints on the knife. A sort of "back up" to her picking up the knife herself, because even if she did, you would think there would still be something there, unless, in her story of picking it up, she also ran her hands all over the handle.

If her "intruder" had the sock over his hand, that would in her mind most likely be the reason no other prints but hers would be found. By discarding it outside of the house, it would look like he stripped it from his hand and dropped it whilst fleeing, same as he did with the knife.

Of course, I also think it would have more blood if really used to hide prints from a perp, but then, I don't think there was a perp and she probably didn't even think there would need to be so much on it.

Replying to an old post, but this theory really clicked with me. I'm thinking she may have put the sock on and picked up the knife to get the sock fibers on the handle, and the few droplets of blood just happened to come from the handle. She wasn't even thinking about blood transfer, otherwise she would have put more on it. Then, she had to ditch the sock outside because otherwise it's a sock from her home in her home that she could have used. "He had a sock on his hand and he ran down the ally". But she ended up using the knife again, making the sock pointless.

 

[Zzzz]

The sock has always been an anomaly. In the photo it definitely looks planted, not dropped. A big man’s tube sock, laid out in a long straight line, right next to the neighbor’s trash can, in obvious sight near the ally. You don’t “drop” a sock like that. But why? To make it look like the neighbor did it? (Darlie blamed him in letters to relatives.) To make it look like the killer really did run through the laundry room to escape?

If she was dumping evidence because she used it to hold the knife, she could have put it in the neighbor’s trash bin or thrown it down the storm drain. Why lay it out on the ground? It’s a puzzle for sure.

Darlie was a psychopath and obviously did many other bizarre things that night. I think this just falls into that category. No rhyme or reason to it.