Found Deceased CO - Suzanne Morphew, 49, did not return from bike ride, Chaffee County, 10 May 2020 #51

[BeachSky]

Thinking of Suzanne's family during their first Christmas without her. Hoping 2021 brings an arrest and justice, I hate the thought of the responsible party going about life with no consequences.

Amen.
BeachSky

 

[Error505]

Has there been any mention of her jewelry in any LE statement or MSM article?

There’s been Zero mention of SM’s jewelry in MSM or by LE.
Her brother, AM never mentioned jewelry either. Waiting for elected officials to take office in Chaffee County....

My 2cents, MOO

 

[Error505]

DBM double post

 

[Curiousobserver]

Here's the thing.

That study covers 11 years. We have data that cover 120 years (with good data for 100 years and excellent data of the same type cited for 60 years, at least). The study cited takes a period in which homicides were declining (they've been rising since 2014 - it will be a while before the CDC takes a look at that, the FBI has the data). If I had more space (this is already a very long post), I'd say more about why I prefer NCADV data.

So the CDC study wasn't "the largest study ever," the study cited is actually a small study of 18 states and in a time when the US/CDC was thinking that its violence problem was...getting better. One could even say that the time period was a bit...cherry picked.

We on this forum have discussed our views on DV in Suzanne's case exhaustively and if you want to go back through the threads, you can, but many of us have already thought through our position on that aspect of the case. I believe AM has also thought it through. I believe it's a very important element of this case.

So, if you were police, you would be looking at BM in either case (55% chance he's the murderer if no DV, 70% or even higher if he's also abusive). Keep in mind that the CDC doesn't conduct research independent of death certificates and legal documents.

How many women are murdered by abusers whose abuse is not documented legally? There's a large literature on it, from sociologists, anthropologists and psychologists. There are even entire books on the subject, over time. If abuse is established via non-legal means (for example, I tell my clinical psychologist about it and get included in a clinical psych study), it will not appear in the CDC data. So the CDC data is, sadly. a rosier picture.

Even more important, though, is the fact that this is a missing persons case.

Not a single no-body homicide is explained in that article.

I am unwilling, at this point, to go with "head injury/wandered off," "mountain lion," or "abduction." Or "ran away."

And I don't think Suzanne staged her own suicide.

Of course, you can think those things if you want and you can even try to figure out how the 45% of murdered women in the CDC study were killed. Having "homicide" on a death certificate doesn't mean that the murderer was ever prosecuted, so there's a batch of who-dunnits out there - how many of the unsolved murders come back to IP?

The data is highly suggestive - suggestive enough that scholars have taken on this topic as a primary field of study. For example, in my own work, I was fortunate enough to be allowed to interview women referred to me by psychiatrists, parole officers, student health clinics, psychologists and pastors (all of whom had experienced unreported DV).

But the data can't come from the CDC - it has to come from elsewhere. The CDC can never have "the largest study" (and would never make that claim - it's a short term snapshot of the problem (try looking at the 1930's or 1970's for a very different view - longterm is always a larger project).

You cannot study or interview the missing. We merely extrapolate.

What a good cop does, IMO, is keep the husband on their radar (if domestic violence is suspected, it may be as high as an 80% chance that the husband did it; if no domestic violence has ever been reported to police, it's 55% - in either case, the husband is obviously the main suspect which was my point - you decided to make it about something else, so here we are). Which was my point - and really, what I wanted to discuss is how astonished I am that in this day and age, spouses much younger than I am do not appear to know this. Any spouse who gets antagonistic with LE, as BM has done IMO, is apparently clueless about life in the US - or they have another motivation.

My current interest is in missing persons, particularly missing women. Suzanne is missing and feared dead. Murdered. Somehow. That's my view on the case. Once she's in that category, the stats on known murders are only suggestive, as we have no stats on the cause of death of people who have never been found.

But I submit to you and to the readers here, that many of the adult women who are missing right now - the pages and pages of women here on Websleuths, were murdered (see numbers below). Some are suicides. The literature we have (not from the CDC - but from academia) suggests that as many as 25% are suicides (clinical psychology case studies have to be read one by one and tallied - and yes, people do that).

So what happened to the other 75%? Doesn't that number at least remind you of another number (the number of women murdered by an abuser?) What if it's only 50%?

Can wilderness misadventure or unseen urban accident really account for 25% of missing women? Are 25% of missing women actually hiding someplace under a new identity? No study shows that. It's really hard to do. I've only been able to find a few cases of women in California where they were actually disappearing themselves and hiding (obviously, they're hard to find, but again, read above about where my data come from). Sex trafficking? (The CDC has no data on sex trafficked adult women that I can find, and the academic literature reveals it's almost entirely children and adolescents, as far as we know - so let's make that less than 1%).

As to whether there was domestic violence (or abuse, because I think we'd find the numbers are similar for non-physical abuse) in Suzanne's case is completely conjecture. But I don't think it's mere hunch or intuition to regard it as likely - likely enough that, yes, BM is a suspect. I think good investigators think about the probability of spousal involvement being higher, even if the abuse did not result in a call to police (although do we know for sure that there was never a call for help from the Morphew household? we do not).

Which was my point.

BM needed to adopt an adult persona and cooperate fully with LE.

He should have allied himself with them (unless he's guilty, of course) and realize that in order to find Suzanne, he has to be ruled out completely - not just by LE but by the community, otherwise, tips keep pouring in that occupy LE time and lead no where.

Anyone who hasn't at least considered BM as a suspect has to have some other bias in their mind, is my point. So BM needed to realize that and act accordingly, as thousands of spouses have done. Innocent people are under the microscope every time a child goes missing (but it's often a parent or parents who are responsible). Ditto for when women go missing. I could provide him with a script if he asked (many people could). LE certainly isn't going to help him think up how to get out of the scrutiny, that's for sure. But there are many things he could have done and didn't do.

In 2019, 62,823 women over the age of 21 went missing and remained missing at the end of the year.

This is an enormous number, dwarfing the number of homicides in the CDC study, which offers no explanation whatsoever for missing persons, but does point us in a direction, I think.

Rounding off, 63,000 adult women were reported missing. What happened to all of them? So many will remain unfound. Cause of death will never be known. No death certificates will ever appear (if a person dies without an identity, such as a homeless person, they do not get a DC with a name on it, but their death, if a homicide, would appear in some future CDC study - and account for some of the 45% of women for whom it is not known whether they suffered DV).

CDC says 25% of women suffer "domestic violence" but 33% of women suffer "sexual violence" (some of that is at the hands of IP - but it is classified so that it would not appear in the study you cited, because I don't believe it's divided up according to the relationship with the attacker).

NCADV disagrees with CDC. It says that at least 33% of American women have suffered DV (which is my sense of it, after years of this type of research - maybe a bit higher than that, since women define DV very differently in the field). This doesn't include seizing control of financial assets, surveillance of the woman, limitations on where the woman can go, marital rape (studied separately with no good studies on overlap with "regular" forms of violence), transmission of sexual diseases due to unfaithful partner, and other incidents that occur rather more often but are not "DV" (women locked out of their houses, money stolen by an IP, women frightened out or pushed out of a car in the middle of nowhere or on a busy highway, etc).

Anyway, I think there are much larger studies. I think the decade-ish period of time chosen for the study you cited is one of the best in US history in its rosy picture of declining crime - a period which is now 6 years over, with 2020 being perhaps one of the worst on recent record (the 1920's and 30's were actually worse; the 1940's saw a real drop both in homicides and in DV - I'm sure we can all figure out the reasons). Why is crime going up again? Why is crime against women consistently underreported? Those 63,000 missing women speak to a much larger problem on our hands.

There are some very good retrospective large scale analyses being published this year, and last. The areas in which the methodology of studying this huge public health problem are being revised.

The CDC is always useful for the generation of hypotheses - but rarely has the answers nor the funding to conduct the kind of research needed. Research funding (NIMH in particular) has been slashed. This is behind a pay wall, but it's the kind of thing that actual researchers are taking into account - in trying to figure out what's happening to missing women. I think the story of murdered missing women is grim, more grim than any of the figures we've been discussing.

Data Missingness Patterns in Homicide Datasets: An Applied Test on a Primary Data Set

There's also interest in "micromarkers" of DV...which provides an entirely different window into these phenomena. As it turns out, the number of women who abuse their male partners may be higher than we realize (but homicide is still a very unusual outcome).

Did Suzanne's friends (and family) notice some of the micro-markers? We know for sure they noticed some of the markers...of DV and abuse/control...

Think I'm going to get another PhD trying to understand all the important things mentioned in this post-

 

[Blue Amethyst]

Still following and hoping for news.

 

[TIGER0822]

Respectfully: Bobcat-Shmobcat!

Today’s disposal of choice for unwanted women is chopping the body into pieces and throwing them out like trash. Preferably into a dumpster or the like which is regularly emptied into a garbage dump at a distant location.
This is and will remain a “no body” case. The pursuit of physical evidence is a blind alley.
If BM did it, the case can only be solved by a meticulous (and brilliant) (and lucky) analysis of his alibi/timeline.
Poor SM’s remains will never be found.

Maybe, although my thoughts are that the two guys who delivered MG’s ‘paycheck’ and the work crew have information which LE would love to get their hands on. If one of them breaks down and speaks it would likely break the case wide open.

 

[TIGER0822]

RBBM
Yes indeed! HE says he answered every question during his 3-30 hours of interviews. But did he answer them truthfully? He also said he took a LDT which appears to be an outright lie. Hmmm..... Oh, and then there’s that mechanical thing he did to his CAT Bob. Hmmm..... You know, he couldn’t remember the right time he did that cause he was SO distraught . And, apparently according to AM, something didn’t line up with his truck GPS. Hmmm..... I could go on and on but there would be a whack of “Hmmm’s.....”

LE did say he was “cooperating” and they hoped he would “continue to do so.” I recall something similar with Patrick Frazee. What else can LE say? He’s cooperating but we know he’s lying through his teeth because we have evidence to prove it? Not going to happen. I just love how this team is going about this case. What they don’t say, says it all.

All IMHO.

Great post! He was also driving around on Sunday morning at 4am to call an employee from out side her gate! Nothing unusual here, I to drive around and call people from outside their gate...better phone reception! Speak MG, speak! IMO

 

[TIGER0822]

I agree. I thought at first it was more than likely there was another woman and speculation about the female coworker added to my suspicion. After hearing her interview, I changed my mind. I didn’t think someone who was involved romantically would go against the “recommendation” of his buddies and turn her phone over to investigators. I also felt a mistress wouldn’t have willingly sat for an interview with LS. Then, as you noted, the months went by and nothing further was heard about it.

IMO if BM is responsible, I think the motive was primarily financial, with a side of general unhappiness at being stuck in the marriage. The notes from Suzanne, that he felt he had to share with the public, convinced me that he was not happy and Suzanne felt it. I’m still on the fence WRT pre-planning.

I listened to the interview and my impression is that there was some past infatuation with BM, or BM with her. Why did he drive outside her gate at 4am to talk with her, after sounding like he had the worst night of his life’. When you are in that position you turn to someone you have (not necessarily romantic)a trusted relationship with. If I needed to talk with some at 4am, I am not calling any work colleague or casual friend. Or even more bizzarely driving to their house and calling them from outside their gate. All IMO

 

[Boxer]

Responding to the bolded sentence - I agree CCSO has been both diligent and disciplined. However, in part their silence results from the lessons learned from the Richard Jewell case and others in which LE leaked information in an effort to put pressure on a suspect, only to find that they had accused an innocent man. So, I don't make too much of it.

MOO I think rather Casey Anthony getting off, haunts police everywhere.

Also MOO. The El Paso Sheriff Office did a fantastic job with media and the public on Gannon Stauch.
Yet EPSO hardly had given any more info to the public. but they held regular PCs.

And a neighbor released some of his compelling security footage.

Unlike LS, BM is not a talker, but like LS, BM is not looking and moving on.

 

[j_in_c]

I listened to the interview and my impression is that there was some past infatuation with BM, or BM with her. Why did he drive outside her gate at 4am to talk with her, after sounding like he had the worst night of his life’. When you are in that position you turn to someone you have (not necessarily romantic)a trusted relationship with. If I needed to talk with some at 4am, I am not calling any work colleague or casual friend. Or even more bizzarely driving to their house and calling them from outside their gate. All IMO

This is pure speculation on my part but I believe there could be dynamic of MG having to play along with any unwanted attention from BM to keep a job. And I think comments or complaints about home life may have been common practice and he may have relied on her for a sympathetic ear (which may have been sympathetic only in as far as she needed stable employment). I have always "read" the comment he made to MG about "keeping the wife happy" as a complaint, "look what I have to do". This is definitely colored by my own lived experience as a woman in a job that is also majority male. I was surprised how often I was treated as a therapist by a small subset of co-workers. As stated, this is purely my impression of why BM would not want get to share her phone with LE and also why she felt the need to defend herself against rumors of an affair.

 

[kittythehare]

This is pure speculation on my part but I believe there could be dynamic of MG having to play along with any unwanted attention from BM to keep a job. And I think comments or complaints about home life may have been common practice and he may have relied on her for a sympathetic ear (which may have been sympathetic only in as far as she needed stable employment). I have always "read" the comment he made to MG about "keeping the wife happy" as a complaint, "look what I have to do". This is definitely colored by my own lived experience as a woman in a job that is also majority male. I was surprised how often I was treated as a therapist by a small subset of co-workers. As stated, this is purely my impression of why BM would not want get to share her phone with LE and also why she felt the need to defend herself against rumors of an affair.

Great points, very well made.
I got a similar impression from reading any articles or interviews she gave.

 

[Boxer]

This is pure speculation on my part but I believe there could be dynamic of MG having to play along with any unwanted attention from BM to keep a job. And I think comments or complaints about home life may have been common practice and he may have relied on her for a sympathetic ear (which may have been sympathetic only in as far as she needed stable employment). I have always "read" the comment he made to MG about "keeping the wife happy" as a complaint, "look what I have to do". This is definitely colored by my own lived experience as a woman in a job that is also majority male. I was surprised how often I was treated as a therapist by a small subset of co-workers. As stated, this is purely my impression of why BM would not want get to share her phone with LE and also why she felt the need to defend herself against rumors of an affair.

Totally agree.
"Keep the wife happy."
He didn't even keep her SAFE.
JMO

 

[Momofthreeboys]

This is pure speculation on my part but I believe there could be dynamic of MG having to play along with any unwanted attention from BM to keep a job. And I think comments or complaints about home life may have been common practice and he may have relied on her for a sympathetic ear (which may have been sympathetic only in as far as she needed stable employment). I have always "read" the comment he made to MG about "keeping the wife happy" as a complaint, "look what I have to do". This is definitely colored by my own lived experience as a woman in a job that is also majority male. I was surprised how often I was treated as a therapist by a small subset of co-workers. As stated, this is purely my impression of why BM would not want get to share her phone with LE and also why she felt the need to defend herself against rumors of an affair.

She had to defend herself because armchair detectives speculated she was a mistress. I am guessing if her info had not been plastered all over we would not have heard a peep from her.

 

[Minordetails]

She had to defend herself because armchair detectives speculated she was a mistress. I am guessing if her info had not been plastered all over we would not have heard a peep from her.

This armchair detective is speculating that MG wasn’t just a shoulder to cry on.

 

[Boxer]

This armchair detective is speculating that MG wasn’t just a shoulder to cry on.

MOO, If she was more, she was classically dominated as a woman worker and she was in a weak position as (past) drug user.
MOO Looks like BM hired to have extra dominance over his workers.

 

[Minordetails]

MOO, If she was more, she was classically dominated as a woman worker and she was in a weak position as (past) drug user.
MOO Looks like BM hired to have extra dominance over his workers.

I think they were both capable (BM and MG) of getting whatever it was they needed from each other.
MOO

 

[Boxer]

I think they were both capable (BM and MG) of getting whatever it was they needed from each other.
MOO

Just my opinion, but they are not peers, there is a power differential and probably big dependency on the job.

 

[StarrDetective]

Just my opinion, but they are not peers, there is a power differential and probably big dependency on the job.

agreed

 

[Minordetails]

Just my opinion, but they are not peers, there is a power differential and probably big dependency on the job.

I agree that there was potential for a power differential in the relationship between BM and MG. Aside from being ‘ordered’ to Broomfield, would MG feel that she was ‘used’ or taken advantage of? I’m not sure. She came across to me as an individual who can look out for herself when she needs to.
JMO

 

[happyday]

Hoping the new year brings closure and justice for Suzanne and her family who loves and misses her. I can’t stand that the person who made her disappear is still free. I sincerely hope she is found and that someone pays for what has happened to her.