Found Deceased CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, did not return from bike ride, Chaffee County, 10 May 2020 #47

[mom2chloe]

I'm not a lawyer, but regardless of any financial gifts from GM, I think Suzanne's will would be the only legal directive on who inherited her share of their marital estate. Maybe she told BM (or he found out) that she was planning on changing her will to name her children as her benefactors, instead of having everything go to him as her spouse. That would be a significant financial loss for him, and would certainly cause a volatile (deadly?) argument. Just speculating.

Idk because again considering her family’s extensive assets they may have wanted someone other than BM to act as guardian or trustee. From what little we do know it seems the Moorman family knew something was up with the lack of communication with SM despite her cancer. Please don’t discount their wisdom yet! Certainly they are privy to so much more than us and equally heartbroken. IMO

 

[Madeleine74]

We’d need a lawyer to answer this, but my sense would be no.

At this stage you’re trying to rule in or rule out a suspect in an ongoing investigation. I can’t imagine that extends to uploading DNA to CODIS, or fingerprints to AFIS.

I could be wrong, but that seems like it would be taking it too far.

ETA: @riolove77???

Agree. The order would be for a specific case, not a fishing expedition.

 

[al66pine]

Agreeing or Refusing to Be Fingerprinted?
Putting aside for a moment any technical, legal discussion, in a situation where a non-criminal, small business owner,* has come into the spotlight on one case, is there any reason for BM/anyone in this circumstance to refuse printing?
If a person had participated in burglaries, robberies, B & E’s, other crimes where prints are already on file from those (solved or unsolved) investigations, I can see a transient might refuse to give prints voluntarily before an arrest and decide to quickly vamoose by moving faaar awaaay.

But for anyone whose prints are not in AFIS, military, or other databases, LE can currently obtain his prints surreptitiously but legally, for ex by picking up paper cup or glass he’s used & left at left at a restaurant. So, refusing to be printed only briefly delays LE obtaining them. Any reason to refuse printing?
Agreeing to be printed early in an investigation would provide a veneer of cooperation w LE, maybe even from BM’s standpoint a cloak of innocence.

IDK whether BM gave prints or was even asked to voluntarily give them. Rambling about possibilities. Jm2cts.

______________________________________________________
* Aside from possible traffic citations and whatever transpired a couple yrs ago at the IN work-site (brawl?), and azz-uming BM was not already on LE’s or IRS radar for another matter.

 

[branmuffin]

I agree with you. The Puma Path home has hundreds of acres of undeveloped mountain wilderness adjacent, that BM would likely have been familar with.

I could imagine that he viewed free access to the forest land as a strong buying point to the Puma Path property.

He probably explored it like a twelve year old boy, looking for antlers. All he would really need is a deep crevice.

If he used that area to dispose of Suzanne, the bike narrative looks like an attempt to point LE in the opposite direction.
Moo

There was a waning gibbous moon on the night of May 9th, 92.7% luminosity of a full moon. That is bright enough to move easily over familiar territory at night. SM weighed 115 pounds. I think it would be easy to carry her without using any machinery. I'm sure the fireman's carry would come in handy.

 

[branmuffin]

A non-testimonial identification order for evidence is used. I don't know if BM consented or not or if LE would still get the order just to cover all their bases even if BM consented, but yes it's standard protocol in criminal case investigations.

IMO

According to the Health and Safety Guide for Landscapers in BC, cuts and lacerations, bruises and contusions account for 20% of all injuries on the job. It would be very normal for BM to have those types of injuries working with rock, chains, and heavy equipment. Many injuries, barring scratches on the face, could probably be explained away.

 

[al66pine]

SM's Marital Estate?

... regardless of any financial gifts from GM, I think Suzanne's will would be the only legal directive on who inherited her share of their marital estate....

@casesensitive bbm sbm Yes, generally speaking, that is, if she has a valid will. But if not, then the state's intestacy statutes apply to assets which would be subject to probate.
And except for public records showing their real est ownership as jt-ten, we do not know as a fact how various assets are titled or registered. Were virtually all prop, assets, accts held in jt-ten, or commingled so that there was no separation of marital prop from sole property? Did she keep some assets, accts in her name only?
Did BM & SM execute a prenuptial agreement w terms which may govern the disposition of property?
On receiving a significant inheritance ($400,000+?), did SM &BM execute a postnuptial agreement?
Postnuptial agreement - Wikipedia After her mother's death several yrs ago, did SM consider another significant inheritance and looking forward, want to clarify her expectations about eventual disposition of it, thus a postnuptial agreement?
Rambling about possibilities, as there are so little we know or can discuss. Jm2cts.

{{{ETA: Macleod v Macleod - Wikipedia case of a couple w prenuptial agreement made at time of 1995 marriage, who in 2002 modified w a postnuptial agreement. During 2005 divorce, conflicts about the two contracts arose. In court of Isle of Man/U.K., tho husband & wife were both US citizens.}}}

 

[Knox]

Is it a known fact? IMO, more along the lines of an unconfirmed report (i.e., no MSM, no public record ). The info about a business sale was by a VI-- meaning no requirement to expand on the info or provide a link. (I already asked).

Knowing the Barry-isms, it could have been info he told a few people in Indiana who repeated what he was throwing out there. I have about as much confidence he sold his business for $1MM, as I do in GD's 400 tours in Iraq.

 

[Deleted member 102539]

dbm - no link available

 

[Deleted member 102539]

My .02 is that 'something' was Suzanne, through no fault of her own !
She said ____ (maybe divorce, or going to LE with something she found out ?), that caused BM to fear discovery more than being charged with murder; maybe some nefarious activities he'd been up to ?

bbm
When this case began and LE didn't release any info, my first thought was: there is an unknown perp -NOT BM- , who is involved into another crime also and LE want to catch him on both cases (like a sk or something). I found the measure excellent.
Later on, when BM behaved like a guilty wife-abductor, I tought, LE want to catch exactly him on more than this last crime in CO.

Meanwhile I learned, that in CO it's usual to handle a crime like that: by not releasing anything to the public.

 

[Deleted member 102539]

dbm

 

[Boxer]

Agreeing or Refusing to Be Fingerprinted?
Putting aside for a moment any technical, legal discussion, in a situation where a non-criminal, small business owner,* has come into the spotlight on one case, is there any reason for BM/anyone in this circumstance to refuse printing?
If a person had participated in burglaries, robberies, B & E’s, other crimes where prints are already on file from those (solved or unsolved) investigations, I can see a transient might refuse to give prints voluntarily before an arrest and decide to quickly vamoose by moving faaar awaaay.

But for anyone whose prints are not in AFIS, military, or other databases, LE can currently obtain his prints surreptitiously but legally, for ex by picking up paper cup or glass he’s used & left at left at a restaurant. So, refusing to be printed only briefly delays LE obtaining them. Any reason to refuse printing?
Agreeing to be printed early in an investigation would provide a veneer of cooperation w LE, maybe even from BM’s standpoint a cloak of innocence.

IDK whether BM gave prints or was even asked to voluntarily give them. Rambling about possibilities. Jm2cts.

______________________________________________________
* Aside from possible traffic citations and whatever transpired a couple yrs ago at the IN work-site (brawl?), and azz-uming BM was not already on LE’s or IRS radar for another matter.

They would need a warrant to fingerprint. But maybe the house warrant took care of that as police would need to ID all prints in the house.

 

[Trackergd]

:
1) If a canine is trying to track a lost or missing person from their home, how can the scent dogs discern recent trails when it is likely the person’s scent would be all around the area? I imagine with physical/tangible tracking, the condition of the prints and the surrounding ground and foliage can give you an idea of how recent the tracks were?
2) If SM had fallen off her bike after going down a steep embankment and had sustained some type of head injury which caused her to wander off in a confused state, can you estimate as to how far she may have wandered? And would she have likely been found by searchers in that area in the following hours or days?

1. When scent trail confusion prevails, the handler will usually take the scent dog outside of the LKP area and then begin to slowly circle the area in an attempt to detect a scent trail leading away from the LKP. If the individual walked or was not encapsulated to prevent skin cells from dropping to the ground, there would be an exit trail. If there is no exit scent trail, the individual is still in the LKP, or was encapsulated in some manner (car, plastic bag, cooler, etc) and removed from the area.

2. That would depend on the severity of the head injury. Closed head trauma can vary. Probably between 100 yards to about five miles, considering an adult in good shape and having water can travel upwards of 30 miles in the right conditions. If there had been significant bleeding, there would have been a blood trail. Either way there would have been shoe prints, scuffs, disturbed vegetation, stone rolls, etc. Really obvious shoe prints if they had been clip-on pedal shoes.

This leads me down another rabbit hole. If SM had been wearing clip-on biking shoes, the prints would have been so obvious that anything LE did, short of complete site obliteration" would have left very distinctive prints. Do we have any confirmation of the particular footwear SM was wearing (never ask what shoes the subject was wearing as you automatically enter into the witnesses mind that they were wearing shoes, when in fact they could have been wearing any manner of footwear or even been barefoot)?

It is not uncommon to arrive at a LKP and find a complete mess created by unknowing but well meaning first responders. Trackers call this the "area of total destruction" and both Trackers and Dog Handlers start working around the fringes of this area to find the exit track/scent trail.

Actor comments that "LE messed up the evidence" (or words to that effect) only makes sense if the actor knows where the evidence was in the first place.

 

[Power of Two]

Actually, I think most were going on earlier comments by AM and PE that the wedding was planned for sometime in June, and didn't learn until later that the wedding had already passed (the couple reportedly married on May 10).

Until learning otherwise, I know I speculated SM planning to attend a June wedding and extending her stay to visit and/or look after her ailing father.

MOO

This is the first I have seen that the wedding was actually on the 10th of May. Suppose Suzanne and her girlfriend were setting up and testing a video link, earlier in the day, in order for Suzanne to be able to be present remotely. When communication was abruptly severed and Suzanne wasn't video linked for the nuptials it makes even more sense that her friend would be alarmed. It wasn't that a conversation was simply cut short, but that Suzanne missed the wedding entirely if, in fact, the wedding was on the 10th. No wonder her friend panicked.

I have family members who got married this summer and we were all able to be 'present' at the ceremony in real-time on the internet via a rather pricey photo videographer and the newlyweds could see that we were all hooked into their ceremony from several parts of the country.

 

[Blue Amethyst]

If you own property jointly then if one person passes away then the assets go to the other..is this correct? But if one person puts their working income into a company then the company owns the assets. So then do only shareholders have any share? If the wife is not included in the company then she is not entitled to anything. JMO

Is it a case of what is mine is mine and what is ours will be mine too?

 

[Megnut]

This is the first I have seen that the wedding was actually on the 10th of May. Suppose Suzanne and her girlfriend were setting up and testing a video link, earlier in the day, in order for Suzanne to be able to be present remotely. When communication was abruptly severed and Suzanne wasn't video linked for the nuptials it makes even more sense that her friend would be alarmed. It wasn't that a conversation was simply cut short, but that Suzanne missed the wedding entirely if, in fact, the wedding was on the 10th. No wonder her friend panicked.

I have family members who got married this summer and we were all able to be 'present' at the ceremony in real-time on the internet via a rather pricey photo videographer and the newlyweds could see that we were all hooked into their ceremony from several parts of the country.

It also makes sense to me that the wedding arrangements were part of an ongoing conversation, one that included internet connectivity issues. When Suzanne began communicating with her friend on the Saturday morning and communication stopped, I wonder if the friend's immediate and then intermediate response was concern over connectivity, not foul play. Amid her busy-ness over the following 24 hours, the friend would naturally be perplexed, why Suzanne wasn't finding an alternate way to connect, if the primary one failed. Makes sense too that, again amid her busy-ness, the friend would attempt to connect with Suzanne over multiple platforms. The initial panic, oh, no, I don't want Suzanne to miss these events!!!

We know from Andy that he communicated with Suzanne through Barry. Perhaps a controller controlled BY controlling access, hiding behind sketchy coverage, somehow avoiding better coverage and the simplest solution, A LANDLINE. But if Suzanne was mostly at home (treatment, then covid), and the husband was roaming freely (see what I did there?), the only way to ASSURE message reception was through the husband, who'd have public access to good connectivity. Whether he'd relay those messages, that's a different story for a different day....

So the friend, easy to believe she reached out to Barry when unable to reconnect with Suzanne. It's what I'd do.

Did he respond? How did he respond?

Did she reach out to the girls? I would.

Because at a certain point, worry that Suzanne was going to miss the festivities due to connectivity issues had to morph into "Suzanne wouldn't miss this. Something is wrong. Wrong-er than bad wi-fi. What do I do? When do I do it? Who do I call?"

Panic.

It's what I'd do.

The person who disappeared Suzanne is going to have to account for his cellphone activity from May 8th through May 12th, including any pattern breaks AND explain for the abrupt end to Suzanne's communications, perhaps as early as the morning of May 9th, including presumably no activity while purportedly still alive on the 10th. That's gonna be hard to do.

So many ways to get oneself tripped up.

If only LE could pinpoint where a certain person went, between about midnight and 4 am on Mother's Day because it seems pretty clear to me, that's where the truth lies.

JMO

 

[Auntie Cipation]

Agreeing or Refusing to Be Fingerprinted?
Putting aside for a moment any technical, legal discussion, in a situation where a non-criminal, small business owner,* has come into the spotlight on one case, is there any reason for BM/anyone in this circumstance to refuse printing?

RSBM

I don't know about volunteers, but I strongly suspect the paid crew at the Chaffee County Fire District have to get fingerprinted upon being hired by the County.

At least, County employees in my California county must do so. (source: I am an employee of my county).

(It is also possible that contractors who contract with the county or state have a similar requirement although this is just a guess, I have no personal knowledge of this.)

MOO

 

[Hoosierfan72]

Agree...not in person anyway. Perhaps she was going to attend the wedding virtually and when her friend lost communication abruptly and then couldn’t reach Suzanne for the wedding she knew something was very wrong?

That's my guess - given the timing, I believe the wedding was either virtual or had a virtual component. On Mother's Day gatherings and air travel were both extremely limited....MOO

 

[oviedo]

I'm not a lawyer, but regardless of any financial gifts from GM, I think Suzanne's will would be the only legal directive on who inherited her share of their marital estate. Maybe she told BM (or he found out) that she was planning on changing her will to name her children as her benefactors, instead of having everything go to him as her spouse. That would be a significant financial loss for him, and would certainly cause a volatile (deadly?) argument. Just speculating.

There is only one reason that I can think of where a married woman would seek a lawyer to draw up a Will just for her naming beneficiaries other than her husband - she was planning to leave. Otherwise, married couples in my experience always do this together. In fact, we don't allow a married couple to disinherit the spouse in my state - unless by pre/post nuptial agreement - it's called elective share should they pass away as a married couple.

IMO I think there was a trigger and this is a rage murder - I have gone back and forth - planned/not planned - and I am back to rage. I just don't think she was leaving him - I think she thought they were in this marriage together - but I could be biased having decided to read through the Watts threads. A confrontation followed by a blow to the head - likely in the kitchen. It's what was done after that I struggle with. Coolers, landscape equipment - hundreds of acres, mine shafts, the river....many many choices.
JMO

 

[hpruitt]

RSBM

I don't know about volunteers, but I strongly suspect the paid crew at the Chaffee County Fire District have to get fingerprinted upon being hired by the County.

At least, County employees in my California county must do so. (source: I am an employee of my county).

(It is also possible that contractors who contract with the county or state have a similar requirement although this is just a guess, I have no personal knowledge of this.)

MOO

1st post! Hope I do this right.
My father was a life member at the Fire Dept/Rescue Squad down the road from our house. It was right on the line between 2 counties so they ran calls in both counties. 1 county supplied the personnel (insurance purposes) & equipment and the other county supplied the land & the building. When he joined, both counties did a background check, fingerprinting, and issued him county IDs even though he was only a volunteer. I'm not sure what they did with his fingerprints but they were done at the Sheriff's office & are on record in his personnel file with both counties.

 

[ReckoningDay]

Having been away for a few days, I was disappointed to return and find there's still been no arrest.