TN TN - Karen Swift, 44, Dyersburg, 30 Oct 2011 - #2

[OldSteve]

From the videos I saw it looks like whoever put her body there did not go very far into the vines. We have it everywhere here in GA and no way would I go walking in the middle of it because no telling what is up under there. I'm thinking she was put there during the night and with it being dark that would make it even worse to think about going into the middle of it. IMHO I feel it could have been the husband because whoever got rid of her had to dispose of her body quickly and he would have had to hurry to get back to the kids before they got up. I feel like a random stranger would have taken her body away from there with them. Most times a body is found this close to home it ends up being a family member that killed them.

Got to wonder if plan was to place her in the river, but upon reaching the kudzu the perp found he could get through it, so left her there....

 

[belimom]

Got to wonder if plan was to place her in the river, but upon reaching the kudzu the perp found he could get through it, so left her there....

That's what I was thinking when I posted above about all the searches near the river earlier that we discussed in the first thread. I think he tried to get to the river but found it harder than he thought and was running out of time to get back home b/c of the children being there.

I think since LE did search the river very close to where she was found, there must have been a cell phone ping or something from that area.

I wonder if her phone was found with her?

 

[tarabull]

Missing Tennessee Mom Karen Swift's Body Found
December 13, 2011

snipped....

Swift's body was in an area covered in vines and that there were no indications that she was killed in a different location, according to the sheriff.

...The sheriff said it could be two weeks before a Memphis coroner releases the final autopsy report. Police are now focusing on finding Swift's killer.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/missing-tennessee-mom-karen-swifts-body-found/story?id=15144724

[more at link including a video]

 

[Dewey2Me1MoThyme]

Box said items recovered from her car could be key to the investigation, but would not elaborate on what the items were.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/missing-tennessee-mom-karen-swifts-body-found/story?id=15144724

 

[tarabull]

I'm still :waitasec:

No indication she was killed in a different location.

So someone drove her out to Bledsoe alive?!?!?!

Somehow I doubt Karen went out there willingly...

 

[~n/t~]

I'm still :waitasec:

No indication she was killed in a different location.

So someone drove her out to Bledsoe alive?!?!?!

Somehow I doubt Karen went out there willingly...

Sure sounds like it, tara. Perp drove her there, murdered her, came back, slashed her tires.

I'm sure evidence in the car will point to a struggle.

 

[SNOWINMEMPHIS]

Considering that Holly Bobo is still missing....maybe there is a serial killer in this part of Tennessee. Not agreeing with the guy on NG last night about the connection to the women found here in Memphis' cemetery.
I live very near to I40 here in Memphis.
The route is one way to get to Dyersburg, but it is quicker to take exits off of I40 to get there.
The next larger town from here on the way towards Nashville on I40 is Jackson.
Approximately 45 minutes east of Jackson is where Holly is missing from.
Jackson is about 45 minutes from Dyersburg in a mainly northern direction.
In other words, it forms a sort of triangle that would be easy for someone who is a longtime resident of west TN to travel and to know well.
For instance, I grew up in Jackson, but was born in Dyersburg.
We lived in Dyersburg for a short time, then in Jackson, and I spent many summers on the river and lakes where Holly Bobo lived.
Now I live here in Memphis, but I know almost all the roads involved in both of these incidents.
Just saying that a male killer who travels this area a lot and knows it as well could be responsible for both.
Easily, IMO.
And although Holly Bobo was much younger, she and KS share the same "type", both blonde and very nice looking.
Just thinking out loud, and after reading more articles this morning, I still don't think that Karen's husband is the one who did this.
Lots of couples divorcing nowadays don't hate each other and manage to work things out amongst themselves.
I'm divorced and don't have kids but I am still in close contact on a regular basis with my ex and we get along very well.
There is a chance that, since she had only filed for divorce 20 days before this, that they may have reached a point where they could stay married or at least not have bad feelings for each other.
She was still living with him and there were no signs, that we know, of domestic violence or such.
So I give him the benefit of the doubt when it comes to killing her, for several reasons, some of them from personal experience.
Who killed Karen and who took Holly Bobo?
In the videos, I see the same TBI shirts and vests and vehicles I saw in Holly's case.
JMHO

 

[SNOWINMEMPHIS]

I'm still :waitasec:

No indication she was killed in a different location.

So someone drove her out to Bledsoe alive?!?!?!

Somehow I doubt Karen went out there willingly...

:waitasec:In my own goofy opinion, I do think she was killed where she was found.
I also believe the perp was/is very aware that kudzu dies off in the winter.
It was a little chilly Halloween weekend (cause Halloween fell on Monday so we all did things that weekend).
Dyersburg Country Club (The Farms) is a nice place.
Karen's neighborhood is very nice.
Maybe this is why NG keeps calling it "an upscale suburb of Memphis".
She's just about an hour and a half wrong in the second part
I am going to posit the theory that she was stalked, like Holly Bobo, that she fit a perp's "type" and that she went back out after bringing her daughter home.
I believe her friend said the texts she sent were at 11:30 pm.
Hope I'm right in that.
So isn't that about the time she went to pick her daughter up from her sleepover?
Maybe she was going to ask her friend to pick her daughter up for her instead?
I know that it isn't being reported that she was seeing anyone else, or for that matter that her husband was.
But it isn't completely out of the picture that either could have been. It isn't my business and I am a grown adult who understands how these things go. Been there myself.
The reason I even bring that up is trying to figure out why she would willingly leave her house again that night.
There had to be a reason.
The tire couldn't have been flat when she left home.
Either she was on her way to meet someone she knew and she was killed there, or someone disabled her tire while she was enroute.
Someone who was stalking her and perhaps knew of her plans.
When a person is talking in casual conversation with a friend, say at lunch, they aren't really always paying attention to strangers around them.
Unfortunately, stalkers and serial killers often are.
It's called "scanning". Looking for information and clues from a potential victim.
Much like people used to use police scanners to listen to cell and home phone conversations.
Most home phones aren't vulnerable to scanners anymore.
But there are people who know how to put the certain crystals into their own built devices that can pick these up.
And then there are those that know how to get into peoples wireless connections, which aren't always as secure as you think.
Just thinking outloud and just my opinion.

 

[LindaG]

I'm still :waitasec:

No indication she was killed in a different location.

So someone drove her out to Bledsoe alive?!?!?!

Somehow I doubt Karen went out there willingly...

That is stunning news. I almost cannot get my brain around it. I wonder if the perp took her in her own car or in a different car. I think there would be too much incriminating evidence left behind in her car, if that is the one they used.

One scenario is that someone from inside the house took her out in a separate vehicle to Bledsoe and kiled her, then came back and moved her car to the spot where it was found, and damaged the tire.

Another scenario: she leaves the house for some reason and is picked up by a killer who gets in her car and drives her to the place where she is killed, drives her car back and cuts the tire. If that happened, he must have had to leave his car there while he took her to the crime scene.

I suppose he could have slashed the tire before taking her away, but he had to have control over her and she was still alive, and probably resisting.

I don't think he found her at the side of the road with a flat tire, since the tire was damaged (slashed/split) and I don't think she would have left home and driven that far with a flat tire.

Very strange turn of events. :waitasec:

 

[belimom]

I'm still :waitasec:

No indication she was killed in a different location.

So someone drove her out to Bledsoe alive?!?!?!

Somehow I doubt Karen went out there willingly...

I think she was somehow incapacitated, taken there, and then maybe murdered - so there would be little evidence elsewhere (home/car/etc)?

 

[SNOWINMEMPHIS]

None of us would leave home with a slit/flat tire unless we were running for our lives, and I know that's a fact!
For some reason, it doesn't seem she was running away that night from anything.
Her daughters didn't hear anything.
She had put her daughter to bed and laid down there with her after picking her up.
Little kids do sleep soundly, and they could have heard arguing before, but I would think there would be evidence if anything happened in the home.
Now LE is saying it appears she was killed where found.
This leads to her either being killed after meeting someone she knew there or having been followed by her killer.
I'm trying to figure out how a tire could have been disabled while being driven.
Surely it is possible, and maybe that explains why the media can't decide whether it was flat or slit?
Arrgh......

 

[SNOWINMEMPHIS]

Belimom, it's strange that there doesn't seem to be any evidence in the home. Or even around the home....
We know HB was incapacitated and taken from her home.
Because blood was left behind.
According to local news, Karen was decomposed and identified by dental records.
There were periods of 60 degree days after she went missing, so that makes sense.
But then the reports have LE saying that there was obvious trauma to her body.
That implies a broken hyoid bone (strangling) or a gun or knife or some weapon to bludgeon.
I just don't have a clue.

 

[Joe Friday]

Got to wonder if plan was to place her in the river, but upon reaching the kudzu the perp found he could get through it, so left her there....

That's what I was thinking when I posted above about all the searches near the river earlier that we discussed in the first thread. I think he tried to get to the river but found it harder than he thought and was running out of time to get back home b/c of the children being there.

I think since LE did search the river very close to where she was found, there must have been a cell phone ping or something from that area.

I wonder if her phone was found with her?

BBM


It would take someone like the Incredible Hulk to be able to carry a dead body 450 yards up and down the hills and thought the woods to the river.

I think who ever murdered Karen drove to this spot and dumped her, they never intended to carry her to the river.


Beings an attempt was made to conceal her body I think it points more to someone who knew Karen. A random stranger would have likely just dumped her body out of the car without going through the trouble of trying to conceal her from view.

Someone didn't want her to be found so they placed her under those vines.

Now they just need to figure out who that was.

JMO

 

[AmyMarie222]

Even if Karen wasn't murdered at home, I don't think that rules David out or points to a serial killer. Perhaps DS didn't want his kids to hear anything. Doesn't mean he didn't do it. MOO.

 

[Gozgals]

Just wanted to add that I have followed Karen's case.

May she Rest in Peace.

Good thoughts to her family and friends.

Goz

 

[belimom]

BBM


It would take someone like the Incredible Hulk to be able to carry a dead body 450 yards up and down the hills and thought the woods to the river.

I think who ever murdered Karen drove to this spot and dumped her, they never intended to carry her to the river.


Beings an attempt was made to conceal her body I think it points more to someone who knew Karen. A random stranger would have likely just dumped her body out of the car without going through the trouble of trying to conceal her from view.

Someone didn't want her to be found so they placed her under those vines.

Now they just need to figure out who that was.

JMO

bbm

I think you're absolutely correct about carrying her body that far to the river. But I was thinking more that the perp headed towards the river, thinking they could get closer in the vehicle. Then once there, couldn't find easy access, didn't have time to keep looking, and found the spot to leave her. JMHO

 

[SNOWINMEMPHIS]

BBM


It would take someone like the Incredible Hulk to be able to carry a dead body 450 yards up and down the hills and thought the woods to the river.

I think who ever murdered Karen drove to this spot and dumped her, they never intended to carry her to the river.


Beings an attempt was made to conceal her body I think it points more to someone who knew Karen. A random stranger would have likely just dumped her body out of the car without going through the trouble of trying to conceal her from view.

Someone didn't want her to be found so they placed her under those vines.

Now they just need to figure out who that was.

JMO

I agree that it would've taken great strength to get her to the river.
And she had to have been under the vines or she would've been found before the frost killed the kudzu.
There is the outside possibility that she was meeting someone out there and it ended in her death. Maybe a man who didn't want his family/wife to find out?
I do believe that there have been serial killers who have hidden bodies before.
And cemeteries are a great dumping spot. Especially an old cemetery like Bledsoe.
We own a family farm in nearby Crockett County TN that has such a cemetery on it. No one buried in ours' since the early 1900's.
Also, I guess there is the creepy coincidence that this was Halloween weekend and she was near a cemetery.
JMO

 

[ThoughtFox]

Even if Karen wasn't murdered at home, I don't think that rules David out or points to a serial killer. Perhaps DS didn't want his kids to hear anything. Doesn't mean he didn't do it. MOO.

Thank you ~ I was thinking the exact same thing.

It always made sense that the husband could ask to talk to her outside. It was nice weather that night, so why not? And then something happened - an argument, or something planned. She's incapacitated at home - a blow to the head maybe. Then taken to the graveyard area and killed.

Makes sense to me.

 

[ThoughtFox]

Also, I guess there is the creepy coincidence that this was Halloween weekend and she was near a cemetery.
JMO

Yes, I just realized how creepy that is! And weird, too - who goes to a graveyard on Halloween night?

 

[TxLady2]

When LE says there is no indication that she was killed in another location, I am going to assume they are saying, in a roundabout way, that there is no indication she was killed at her home, or in her own car, or at any point between. I don't think it makes sense that the husband would have killed her and dumped her body several miles from there and then gone back and slashed the tire and risk being seen by someone he knows, leaving it on the side of the road. Besides, her body was not that hard to find, it was not very well concealed. An angry spouse who kills is going to try to hide the body.... bury it or throw it in the river or a lake. And I'm sure that there are other spots around that gives easier access to the river, rather than on that road next to the cemetery.

This very much sounds like a predator type murder to me, not an angry spouse. She has a flat tire, pulls over on the side of the road, someone comes along, gets out to help, cuts a slit in the tire, which someone could do in 2 seconds with her not even seeing him do it, says "let me give you a ride", she gets in his car and he takes her to the dump site, rapes her and kills her. He's not worried about her car being found because he's out of the area by daylight. And it is surprising how many women and young girls are killed in exactly this same way, a predator sees an opportunity and takes it. Some of them get by with it for a long time. And sometimes the victims are not found for months or even years.