Found Deceased CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, did not return from bike ride, Chaffee County, 10 May 2020 #35

[Diddian]

I do not think anyone else took Suzanne.
But his video was very odd and it could have been an offer of a bribe to some one who knew about illegal activities to keep them quiet.

I think his video was odd because he did the same thing with it as he did with his early explanations to LE and TD for her disappearance; he tried to keep alive multiple scenarios by which she disappeared that did not involve himself. Those early explanations included: (1) she was taken by a mountain lion, (2) she was abducted by a stranger, perhaps someone who hit her or forced her off the road, (3) she was abducted by someone she knew, or (4) she crashed and wandered off injured, perhaps into the river.

In the video, BM was trying to act like he imagined the husband of a missing wife might act if he thought she might have been abducted; he made an appeal to these imagined abductors ("Anything you want, I will pay..."). But, he also acted like the husband of a wife who faked her own disappearance might act; he made an appeal directly to Suzanne, as though she purposely disappeared and just needed to be convinced to return ("Oh Suzanne...your girls need you...").

 

[Murphy1950]

If the trial started today, and I’m prosecuting, my star witness has to be SM’s texting friend - she better have something good.

After that, it gets sketchy. I could call AM as a witness and have him share his recollections. But AM better hope the reasons for the family estrangement that happened in Indiana aren’t relevant - if they’re even remotely relevant, the defence will bring them up.

The other employees MG, JP and CC. I guess I could call them up, but do I know what I’m going to get? Are they going to get their facts straight and will their accounts line up? If not, and the defence starts digging, it’s possible that the employee testimonies just end up making the waters dirty.

The witnesses all have a story to tell and there’s an element of truth in all of their stories, but without any digital info, it’s as clear as mud.

I'm not too concerned with the witnesses. Seems the electronic/digital/ping evidence is all that's needed to make a strong case for the most part. Any credible witness story would be icing on the cake. I said witness story, not credible witness. Thinking in terms that one of MG's details is backed up by video for example.
I may be misinterpreting your post or have some information wrong (we may be thinking the same track )but as I see it currently there are zero witnesses to the Gannon Stauch disappearance and murder and but an incredible amount of very convincing evidence.

As a juror I'd rather hear evidence of a phone ping, said phone belonging to the suspect, at the crime scene than a 'witness' who saw someone fitting the description of the suspect.

 

[ReckoningDay]

Just great: we can add others.
A gardener: to remove those unwanted growths among the roses.
A student: finding my things for my class.
A carpenter: where is that thing to measure with etc/
We can go on...

Can't you see a carpenter saying "Dang &%$# it! I smashed my thumb with the carpentry tool!" ?

 

[Fireflize]

This way out there.
I read an article about covid-19. It's theory was that it had actually become active in the early fall of 2019. Satellite imagery had picked up a spike in traffic to chinese hospitals at that time which exceeded prior years.

I wonder if satellite imagery could pick up a lone vehicle in a remote area, where no traffic should be.

 

[Fireflize]

Can't you see a carpenter saying "Dang &%$# it! I smashed my thumb with the carpentry tool!" ?

Right?!? It's so much easier to say "attachment" or "scoop" than to say "mechanical thing." I think that attachment or scoop is evidence. BM didn't want to go there. Because the next question would be "why" or "what did you use that attachment for." Moo

 

[RickshawFan]

I'd like to buy a clue. No I mean it. Why not start a fund to bribe the witness's to answer some questions. Hey Morgan heres 1000 dollars - just need a sworn statement...imo kinda like a go fund me ......I think outside the box sometimes just saying

Wouldn't that taint the evidence in a court trial? A "witness" could just make stuff up for the $$$.

 

[Birmingplumb]

Right?!? It's so much easier to say "attachment" or "scoop" than to say "mechanical thing." I think that attachment or scoop is evidence. BM didn't want to go there. Because the next question would be "why" or "what did you use that attachment for." Moo

Great post! Got me thinking ...I wonder if he owns a acetylene torch- it could be used to burn off any evidence on the steel attachments bucket etc ...or worse if he had time- imo

 

[swedeheart]

Thank you for adding more info to mine. I know SM's family and knew Suzanne, and she would have been horrified for anyone to think that she might have been part of something like this!!

MOO

welcome to websleuths, @NatureLover, and i am certainly terribly sorry for your reasons for being here.

just wanted to say, i imagine BM was up to no good, doing something illegal behind SM's back, and she, as you just said, would have NEVER tolerated it. i believe this, combined with greed, was his motive. she caught him red-handed.

i hope justice is coming soon.

 

[Birmingplumb]

Wouldn't that taint the evidence in a court trial? A "witness" could just make stuff up for the $$$.

I thought i covered that with using "sworn statement" but thanks for re-opening this---was thinking the tabloids pay these folk for interviews daily mail etc many i learned here...just want the right questions asked....just want the guy witness #3 to tell what he knows....only motive I see from them "moving" is running from truth.....just saying...stay put answer the questions and lead your normal life where u are...IMO

 

[K9Enzo]

I think his video was odd because he did the same thing with it as he did with his early explanations to LE and TD for her disappearance; he tried to keep alive multiple scenarios by which she disappeared that did not involve himself. Those early explanations included: (1) she was taken by a mountain lion, (2) she was abducted by a stranger, perhaps someone who hit her or forced her off the road, (3) she was abducted by someone she knew, or (4) she crashed and wandered off injured, perhaps into the river.

In the video, BM was trying to act like he imagined the husband of a missing wife might act if he thought she might have been abducted; he made an appeal to these imagined abductors ("Anything you want, I will pay..."). But, he also acted like the husband of a wife who faked her own disappearance might act; he made an appeal directly to Suzanne, as though she purposely disappeared and just needed to be convinced to return ("Oh Suzanne...your girls need you...").

When BM did his video, at that time I really wasn't side eyeing him yet. I thought the same as the bolded - was he trying to coax his missing wife out of hiding? It was "too soon" to talk. Maybe she was unstable and had a moment. Of course I don't believe that now and that video has given me several opinions over the months. IMO

 

[Birmingplumb]

I'm not too concerned with the witnesses. Seems the electronic/digital/ping evidence is all that's needed to make a strong case for the most part. Any credible witness story would be icing on the cake. I said witness story, not credible witness. Thinking in terms that one of MG's details is backed up by video for example.
I may be misinterpreting your post or have some information wrong (we may be thinking the same track )but as I see it currently there are zero witnesses to the Gannon Stauch disappearance and murder and but an incredible amount of very convincing evidence.

As a juror I'd rather hear evidence of a phone ping, said phone belonging to the suspect, at the crime scene than a 'witness' who saw someone fitting the description of the suspect.

I agree-except the 3 may be more than witnesses.

 

[Kittybunny]

So I've seen a lot of speculation around the conversation with Suzanne's friend in Indiana as triggering Barry, but personally, I don't think this was the event. I am still very much in the pre-meditated camp (though I have definitely gone from weeks down to a day or hours), a couple of other significant timeline events surround Suzanne's disappearance that should be considered.

1. The girls being away from home, probably for the first time in a while given COVID; and
2. Suzanne's appointment on Monday - all things I've read lead me to believe she had completed treatment and was in the clear - was this like a capstone or celebratory appointment? I thought that was the implication.

Regardless, I wonder if the two events coming together weren't an opportunity or catalyst for Suzanne in which she gathered her courage and let BM know that she was moving on. Could have happened Friday night, could have happened Saturday morning. Whenever she told him, BM starts realizing the implications and impact her leaving is going to have on his life - his image, and especially, his pocketbook.

So he takes off in the morning for the beach site, a rough plan formulating in his head. He knows she goes on bike rides Sunday morning, and has established that with others. Maybe he already had it in his mind as draft plan, maybe he sees it as an easy explanation for her to go missing. He puts some of the pieces in place to get himself an alibi out of town, maybe gets supplies or something in town if that rumor of him being in town is true, and then heads home. I find it hard to believe he would have done the deed in broad daylight for some reason. I think of many killers who prefer to wait for their victims to be asleep. Not sure. It tightens the timeline and leaves the "abrupt communication" thing a bit unexplained if BM killed SM in the middle of the night. But I also don't think he did any outright body disposal in broad daylight either, so I think by Sunday morning at 5am(?) the only thing left to do was stage the bike and head to Broomfield for final cleanup.

This is all just MOO.

 

[Diddian]

When BM did his video, at that time I really wasn't side eyeing him yet. I thought the same as the bolded - was he trying to coax his missing wife out of hiding? It was "too soon" to talk. Maybe she was unstable and had a moment. Of course I don't believe that now and that video has given me several opinions over the months. IMO

I think BM provided the rare opportunity for all to see the elusive Colorado Mountain Liar captured on video.

 

[10ofRods]

He strikes me not with the moodiness, but with rigid thinking. His preoccupation with finances, so amply shown after his wife disappeared, what is it? Obsessed about money...

I agree, although the past few days I've been thinking about what BM was up to, that weekend of May 10.

If we are to believe he was at a work site on Saturday morning, goes home to do hike and bike with wife, then goes shopping, then goes to another worksite at around midnight to do some minor "mechanical thing" to a piece of machinery, then gets up early (estimated 4 am) to leave the house at 5 am, to drive 3 hours to Broomfield, where he does something or other...

Sounds very high energy, even hypomanic to me. The obsession about money is common to many bipolars, btw, especially when they're dipping in and out of depression (they become convinced they don't have enough money, they see themselves as poor, then they launch themselves into manic/hypomanic efforts to get money).

I dunno, it's just a thought. In the very little we've heard him actually say, his speech is rapid, even forceful at times. He is far too eager to talk to TD, imo, seems to have his mind jumping around, speech is coherent but rapid and many thoughts trail off. Some of the phrases he uses ("Let me tell you what happened!" have already been analyzed here, but it does sound a bit grandiose, given that clearly no one knows what happened to Suzanne (except, perhaps, BM himself - yet what he then does is expect TD to believe his rather incoherent account).

He also does that thing where he exaggerates (400 tours of duty, 200 mile search radius, continues to search by bike day after day, etc.). That's considered "expansive speech" (in write-ups of this kind of behavior, we would never say "lying," at least not in any clinical record).

Naturally, all of this could be merely the result of the events he was living through, for sure. But on the weekend of May 10, he apparently went almost entirely without sleep (until he crashed at the hotel?)

If he wasn't busy covering up a crime, it is unusual behavior indeed (to be fiddling around with a Bobcat until after midnight on Saturday, when it wasn't needed for the job in Broomfield, when he had already had a full day and was aiming to get up very very early on Sunday).

I probably entertain this point of view in part due to my own hope that BM will actually crack and at least say something that's even more incriminating (he appears to have some control over his own behavior - although I am mystified by why he moved out of the family home and is living in a condo in Poncha Springs - that was impulsive, and it's possible the move to CO was impulsive as well).

 

[MadTing]

The most interesting part for me about BM talking about the "mechanical thing" he did to his bobcat is that if he used the bobcat to aid in the disposal or SM's body i don't believe for one second he would volunteer that information if he didn't have too. He could make up any other story to fill in the gap in the timeline that didn't bring attention to the bobcat.

I would not be surprised if LE have him on video on more than one occasion towing the bobcat during that day with different attachments on it they asked him to explain it.

 

[Feistyomi]

I am trying to keep current, while catching up on my missing threads...I’ve begun watching PE interview with AM, not going to be able to finish in one sitting...

MVHO, AM truly suspects BM, doesn’t make him guilty.
BM truly suspects AM, doesn’t make him guilty, either.

MOO, both parties have to have been proposed as POIs, therefore both have been scrutinized by LE, 4 months in, no probable cause on AM, search warrants, etc. Is it possible HE has just realized BM isn’t guilty? Area of search based on suspicion of BM or acceptance that that has not proven to be possibility...

WOULDN'T crisscrossing pointing fingers of suspicion have had some results?

To clarify, I began my theories, using random suspect, but realized lately, this is a bit inaccurate, tho still slim possibility. It is more like a perp who has had minimal contact with SM, perhaps thru her husband or her own brief contact...on the sidelines, watching and waiting.

Someone familiar with the area, and is still in the area. Someone who sits back and watches all the developments, smugly thinking he has gotten away with it. Someone who understands that as long as BM is under suspicion, they are safe. Should that change, they have a plan, but for now, they are comfortable...
I hope this search causes them to slip up ...not necessarily find her, that becomes increasingly less likely.

 

[swedeheart]

new crime online:

Former employee of Suzanne Morphew’s husband claims Barry Morphew fired her because she handed her phone over to investigators

 

[Hatfield]

...snipped by me for focus below....

....I am mystified by why he moved out of the family home and is living in a condo in Poncha Springs - that was impulsive, and it's possible the move to CO was impulsive as well).

Re BBM
I am mystified as well. IMO, there should be no reason to not want to stay in your own home unless something bad happened there and it kept reminding you of that event.

Even if people kept driving around the area, that should not be reason enough to not sleep in your own bed. His home was already remote to begin with and he could easily protect it from people driving right up to his house by putting a chain across his driveway if he wanted to.

There has to be a reason he does not want to be in that home anymore.
JMO

 

[Chelly]

I don't know how tall Suzanne was or what she weighed but she looks so very tiny in her pictures.

I just did an experiment with one of my DH's Igloo hunting coolers and my 5'5" tall daughter laid on her back in it with knees to her chest but couldn't get her head down enough for me to close the lid. Then another employee walked up and he's 5'3" and he curled in a ball facing down and he fit just fine. And he didn't even take his ball cap off.

This is one image I can't get out of my head!

 

[oviedo]

Re BBM
I am mystified as well. IMO, there should be no reason to not want to stay in your own home unless something bad happened there and it kept reminding you of that event.

Even if people kept driving around the area, that should not be reason enough to not sleep in your own bed. His home was already remote to begin with and he could easily protect it from people driving right up to his house by putting a chain across his driveway if he wanted to.

There has to be a reason he does not want to be in that home anymore.
JMO

where was he grilling in those pictures? Dailymail says at the house July 18? so when did this move take place I wonder?
Husband of missing Colorado mom spent the night before her disappearance at cheap Denver hotel | Daily Mail Online