Mystery Man Tracks Murder in the Himalayas

by Jonathan Green

I’m not sure whether my epiphany dawned on a remote, snowy mountainside - in the shadow of Mount Everest on the Tibet border at 14 feet above sea level - one of the most hostile environments on the face of the earth. Or if it was simply sitting in my basement office making calls over several months to reluctant interviewees that were never returned.

Either way, a few months after starting my investigation into the murder of 17-year-old Tibetan Buddhist nun, Kelsang Namtso, by Chinese paramilitary soldiers – a killing witnessed by at least 100 Western mountain climbers, many of whom refused to bear witness to what they had seen – I began to think I had set myself an impossible task.

Conventional wisdom is that writing a book is like climbing a mountain. I had to do both, but even that wasn’t the hard part.

As an investigative journalist it’s easy to take for granted that, although the job is not without it’s challenges in the US, at least freedom of speech is enshrined in the constitution and is upheld in daily life. You don’t get 15 years for speaking to a journalist in, say, Wisconsin.

But I was investigating a state-sanctioned murder in modern-day Tibet, one of the repressed places on the face of the earth. Tibetans face 15 years in prison just for talking to a Westerner, over e-mail or the phone, about the political situation in their country. Let alone talking to a Western reporter about a murder by the Chinese police.

And therein were the first of many problems of reporting a narrative set in three countries separated by the highest mountain range in the world in regions were free speech is criminalized.

At the heart of my story are two girls from remotest Tibet, best friends, who nursed a dream to escape Tibet, cross the high Himalaya, all in the hope of a few seconds with the Dalai Lama. They joined 75 other refugees before tragedy struck. Kelsang was murdered in front of Western climbers. Many didn’t want to talk about what they had seen lest they upset the Chinese authorities and were refused entry back to climb in Tibet again.

But, I persevered, and therein I found a redemption of sorts.

Because, in stark contrast to these obstacles, a few extraordinarily brave people stood up against the might of modern-day China to help me bring the injustice of the murder of an amazing young woman to light.

The first was her best friend, Dolma Palkyi (right), whom I spent weeks interviewing and who gave selflessly in talking about the killing of her friend, which she witnessed first hand. She did so because of her conviction that, simply, people needed to know the circumstances of Kelsang’s murder.

And secondly, a very brave Romanian climber Sergiu Matei, who risked his life to film the murder, saved a Tibetan refugee and then smuggled footage of the murder out to the world. Today, the loop of the shooting plays all over the globe on Youtube and other outlets as a permanent memorial to the bravery of a young woman who was murdered while trying to escape to a better life of religious freedom and for a brief meeting with the Dalai Lama.

After many years of struggle, my book slowly evolved and so did a truth and realization in my work, and perhaps a valuable life lesson too. It was that, no matter how hard things appear, there will always be the brave, the few, who will help us whether we are journalists, police officers, attorneys or anyone else who works in the field of justice. And that despite an army of uncaring, or unhelpful or plain obstructive, if just one person stands up to speak out against injustice it can, and does, make all the difference in the world.

Murder in the High Himalaya by Jonathan Green is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and in all good bookstores. Jonathan Green is an award-winning journalist and author. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Men's Journal, the Financial Times Magazine, British GQ and Esquire and the Mail on Sunday's Live magazine among many other publications.

Tweet

Physician, Friend and Mystery Man, Doug Lyle

by Andrea Campbell

Doug Lyle is a colleague of mine through the Mystery Writers of America, and he is a friend. To celebrate the arrival of his new book, Stress Fracture, we decided an interview was in order. Doug teaches forensic science online classes for DeSales University's Masters of Criminal Justice program. He has an interesting Web site page called The Writer's Medical and Forensics Lab, and I find him an excellent writer and author.

Q.: Doug, for Women in Crime Ink readers who don’t know you, please give us a little about your background.

A.: I'm a Southerner, having grown up in Huntsville, Alabama, graduated from the University of Alabama for both college and medical school and then did my cardiology training at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston. I now practice cardiology in Orange County, California. I write both fiction and nonfiction, have won the Macavity Award, and been nominated for an Edgar Award. I also consult with the writers of many TV shows, including Law & Order, CSI: Miami, Diagnosis Murder, Monk, Judging Amy, Peacemakers, Cold Case, House, Medium, Women’s Murder Club, and 1-800-Missing.

Q.: You are considered an expert in forensic science. How do you use those skills?

A.: I don't work in the forensic field and do not consider myself an expert but more an interested party. Being a physician, the terminology and the science behind forensic science is not foreign to me, so it wasn’t difficult to educate myself in the field. Now I use it to translate this often difficult science into simple terms for writers and hopefully to help them use this information in their stories. So I'm more or less a translator for fiction writers.

Q.: What are you doing to stay abreast of today’s forensic science?

A.: I read anything and everything that has to do with the field. I stay on top of it through the many scientific blogs, scientific journals, and rummaging around the net. I will say that a lot of my research is stimulated by the questions I receive from writers who want to know some forensic detail for their story. I probably learn more from the questions that are asked than the questioner learns from my answers. I am constantly amazed at the creative mind of fiction writers and the wild scenarios and questions they come up with.

Q.: What do you think about the state of forensics today? Do you see progress being made? Are we staying ahead of the criminals?

A.: Like any science, forensic science progresses in fits and spurts. The hot topic of recent years has been DNA and there have been some incredible advances in this arena. With the new so-called "touch DNA" techniques, investigators are finding DNA samples in places they never looked before. A simple fingerprint will often contain the person's DNA because these prints are made up of oils and skin cells left behind when an object is touched. With the newer DNA testing techniques a single cell is enough for DNA profiling in many cases.

Q.: Thank you for the review copy of your latest book, Stress Fracture. Can you provide a brief book jacket explanation?

A.: Stress Fracture is the first in my new Dub Walker series. It’s set in Huntsville and revolves around the world of murder and forensic science. In the story, a series of brutal killings take place that are very confusing to Dub in that each killing suggests that the killer on one hand is cold and methodical while on the other is frenzied and out of control. It creates a difficult profiling situation and makes tracking the killer problematic. He leaves little evidence behind yet appears to be completely insane, a situation that the profilers call a "mixed presentation." Of course, it becomes personal when a close friend of Dub’s is murdered and both Dub and his ex-wife Claire McBride are threatened directly by the killer.

Q.: Your main character, Dub Walker, is a crime scene and evidence analyst. What is he responsible for? Are you are going to pepper all your stories with forensic science details?

A.: Dub almost made it through medical school but dropped out three months from the finish line when his sister was abducted. He was supposed to meet her at a certain place and at a certain time but was delayed. When he got there she was gone. Never seen again. This drove him into depression, which ultimately led to him joining the Marines where he was an MP and got his head screwed back on. After that, he worked at the Alabama Department of Forensic Science in Huntsville where he gained his expertise in forensic investigations. He also did a stint with the FBI's Behavioral Assessment Unit where he learned more about criminal behavior. He then became a writer and teacher on these subjects, which led to his being consulted on difficult cases around the country. He brings a broad spectrum of knowledge and experience to the cases and has a knack for thinking outside the box.

And yes, each story in the series relies heavily on forensic science. Stress Fracture deals with PTSD as well as criminal behavior and the second in the series, Hot Lights, Cold Steel, which is already completed and will be out in 2011, deals with robotic surgery. So each book contains not only forensic science but also medical science.

Q.: Would you care to share details about your writers' forensic blog?

A.: I started the blog in order to communicate with writers about forensic issues. It is meant primarily for writers though I have readers who cover a very broad spectrum, including police officers, attorneys, forensic experts, and many others. I try to take something interesting that I've seen in my net searches, or maybe stimulated by a question from a writer, or perhaps some crime story that appears in the papers or on television, and use that as a springboard to discuss some forensic technique. When I post things to my blog I always attempt to keep writers in mind and ask myself—What about this story might help a writer with something they're working on or perhaps generate a new story idea? And of course, I learn a lot doing it.

Q.: Is there anything else you would like to tell Women in Crime Ink readers?

A.: Those of you who write, keep writing. Those of you who read, keep reading. We writers love our readers.

Tweet

Seven Days of Rage

by Paul LaRosa

My new book on the Craigslist Killer case – “Seven Days of Rage” – was just published and here’s what bothers me most about the feedback so far: the idea that it's somehow okay to murder and attack prostitutes. All three of suspected killer Philip Markoff’s victims were sex workers. One describes herself as an escort, another as a stripper, and the dead woman – Julissa Brisman (photo left) – told friends she gave erotic or sensual massages.

I expected criticism when the book was released because, as I’ve learned from writing three previous true crimes books, there is always criticism. Usually, the flack is directed at me for making oodles of money off these cases (definitely not true), and this time I expected that a fair number of people would be offended that the book was written and released well before Markoff stands trial. I understand the concept of “innocent until proven guilty” but I was not troubled by it in this instance because, frankly, I’ve never seen or heard of such damning evidence against a defendant as there is against Markoff. His lawyer, a good one, is going to have to pull a Houdini to get his client out of this one.

What gets to me is the large number of viewers and readers who posted comments in the forums of both “48 Hours Mystery” and the Boston Globe (I co-wrote this book with Globe police reporter Maria Cramer), who think the Craigslist Killer’s three victims deserve what they got because of what they did for a living. Certainly, by choosing to be sex workers, they were inviting trouble, but does that make Markoff’s alleged crimes any less violent and cruel because of what his victims did for a living? To many people out there, the answer is ‘yes’ as if these women were somehow less than human.

It's so easy to pass judgment when you've never met these victims. But I've spoken to Trisha Leffler, the Craigslist Killer’s first victim (photo right), quite a bit as I prepared the book and television program. I can tell you that, although I believe she’s misguided in her chosen line of work, she’s a sweet person who keeps her word. And she is all too human – she lives with her parents, has trouble meeting her car payments, and is trying to make ends meet these days by selling scented candles.

As for the Craigslist Killer’s only murder victim, Julissa Brisman, well, all you have to do is look at her mother’s face to realize that she too was a real person who meant a lot to her family and friends – whether she was a sex worker or not!! Julissa’s mother Carmen is heartbroken and has taken down all the photographs of her daughter that once adorned the walls of her New York apartment. She can no longer bear to look at them and thinks about what happened to the precious girl she raised as a single mother. The holes on the walls, where those photos once hung, are a very sad reminder of the toll murder takes no matter what line of work the victim happens to be involved in.

___________

"Seven Days of Rage: The Deadly Crime Spree of the Craigslist Killer" is Paul LaRosa's fourth true crime book. In addition to being an author, Paul is a long-time producer for CBS's 48 Hours.

Tweet

Forensic Psychology and Dangerous Women

by Larry A. Morris, Ph.D.

When I was approached by my agent, Claire Gerus, to write a book about women who commit violent crimes, I spent a long time considering her proposal. I had concerns. Sure I had been working as a clinical and forensic psychologist for over three decades and had lots of experience with women who murder, maim, and molest. But most people think of men, not women, when they think of violent criminals.

Even though a couple of my previous books, Males at Risks: The Other Side of Child Sexual Abuse (1989, with co-authors Bolton and MacEachron) and The Heterosexual Male: Lust in His Loins, Sin in His Soul? (1997), explored issues of interpersonal violence from a male’s perspective, the controversial finding that males can be victims of child sexual abuse and other violence perpetrated by females was also examined.

Over the years I received both praise and condemnation for suggesting that girls and women sexually abuse children, especially boys, at a rate much higher than “official” reporting statistics documented. The voices of condemnation were the loudest and most persistent.

Even now, with the media full of stories about attractive female teachers molesting grade-school boys, I am dismayed by the number of voices who try to minimize the rape of male children by female teachers by calling it something else—an affair. Even some of my male friends and colleagues joined the chorus of gender-biased sexual expectations with a refrain straight from the male socialization hymnbook: “Oh Lord! Where in the hell were these women when I was in grade school?”

If I decided to write a book about mothers, sisters, and daughters who assault, commit murder, and sexually abuse children, I knew I would be sticking my neck out again, even further this time, by exposing the darkest of the dark side of femininity. I knew I again would be faced with proponents of the pervasive cultural stereotype that women are victims, not perpetrators, of interpersonal violence. The voices of dissent would be back. In force. And, as my thirty years of experience as a clinical and forensic psychologist taught me, some women can be very dangerous.

One of my colleagues, a victim of a female stalker, suggested I should pack “heat” like she does, if I decided to write the book and make public appearances. “Don’t leave home without it,” she quipped. “And wear your body armor,” she added.

As a forensic psychologist, I have evaluated hundreds of violent criminals and testified in court numerous times. The most frequent cases involve questions about the defendant’s competency to stand trial and/or issues of insanity. Competency generally refers to an accused’s ability to understand legal proceedings and to assist legal counsel in his or her own defense. While most people think insanity is a mental-health term, it is a legal term in the courtroom and, in most states, is defined by an individual’s ability to know the difference between right and wrong at the time he or she committed the crime.

For example, a murderous mother could suffer from a serious mental illness, but if she knew what she was doing when she killed her children was wrong, she is not insane according to the law.

Because the interface between law and psychology in insanity defense cases is often like a bad marriage, forensic mental health experts often squabble about their differing opinions.

It is also common for forensic mental-health experts to evaluate defendants in order to assess their risk for committing additional violent crimes and the defendant’s chances of responding favorably to psychotherapeutic intervention.

As a clinical and forensic psychologist I have been able to draw from both areas of expertise to address these very important questions.

In spite of society’s tendency to view most female and male criminal behavior differently, I attempt to handle all forensic cases with the same level of objectivity and dedication as any criminal case, regardless of gender. I ask the referral source the same questions about the purpose of the evaluation, review countless documents related to the case, conduct incisive interviews with the defendant, and consult to the referral source about my evaluation findings and opinion about the case. I also interview others related to the case, if appropriate; administer psychological tests, if helpful; write a report, if requested; and testify in court, if summoned.

Some forensic cases require a fairly quick evaluation and a brief interaction with the court. Many require countless hours of work and lengthy adversarial encounters. Case files can fill a warehouse. Interviewing defendants and others associated with a case can go on for hours. Court testimony can stretch into days. Even though forensic work can be grueling, I always look forward to the next interesting and challenging cases.

As a clinical psychologist, I specialized in treating victims and perpetrators of interpersonal violence, especially child sexual abuse. My clinical work helps me understand both sides of the tragedy of trauma. Seeing the terrible damage done by childhood abuse, I am not surprised when I find a history of trauma in my forensic cases. And, yes, more women are victims than men.

As I continued to consider my agent’s book proposal, I thought about presenting cases of girls and women who murdered and/or committed sexual crimes with an eye toward understanding and prevention. I opened my forensic files of dangerous women to see what I could find. Their stories were compelling. I decided to write the book. We settled on a title: Dangerous Women: Why Mothers, Daughters, and Sisters Become Stalkers, Molesters, and Murderers. It has been released to the public. Should I strap on a new set of body armor? . . .


Larry A. Morris, Ph.D. is a clinical and forensic psychologist who has been in private practice for more than thirty years. He is the author of four books including The Male Heterosexual, plus book chapters in A New Psychology of Men and Adult Survivors of Sexual Abuse. Dr. Morris lives in Tucson, Arizona.

Tweet

New Mystery Man Coming Friday

We hope you read our last Mystery Man column, a collaboration from a dynamic duo in cracking cold cases in Texas. Our next guest contributor comes from the desert and is an expert in cracking the criminal psyche. Tomorrow, look for our 11th Mystery Man, a clinical and forensic psychologist. He spent part of his summer in the hills of old Colonial Mexico conducting personal research on the pleasures of tequila.

For more than thirty years, he has evaluated and treated victims and perpetrators of interpersonal violence. In doing this work, he has performed hundreds of forensic evaluations and testified as an expert witness in state and federal court in cases of murder, rape, assault, domestic violence, and child sexual abuse.

He is the author or co-author of four books. The cover of his most recent publication inspired him to consider developing a line of autographed cutlery—oh, yes, he does have a great sense of humor.

Read what this man has to say on the subject of women in crime this Friday, right here at Women in Crime Ink.

Tweet

Did Beautiful, Young Florida Mom Kill Her Baby Girl? Two Legendary Homicide Detectives Weigh In

Along with the rest of the nation, Women in Crime Ink has been following the mysterious case of Caylee Anthony, the missing toddler whose mother, Casey, has been jailed in connection with her child's disappearance. We asked two veteran Texas homicide legends, Detective Roger Wedgeworth (above left) and his partner Detective Harry Fikaris (right), to give us their seasoned take on the case. Specifically, did a beautiful, young Florida mom kill her baby girl?

Q: What do you think happened to Caylee Anthony?

A: The case is very bizarre. If we’ve learned anything over the years, it's that you can't look at people like Casey Anthony and compare her to a normal person. People who have kids and are from a semi-functional family cannot even comprehend how a toddler like Caylee can go missing for an hour, much less 31 days, without getting police involved. The mother’s nanny story is a complete lie because there is not one person or piece of evidence that can prove the "nanny" ever existed.

Homicide 101 says you have to clear the mother first and her lack of cooperation has made it impossible to eliminate her as a suspect. Every part of this unfolding story points to the mother having killed her daughter and disposed of the body. Make no mistake. This woman knows what has happened to her child. Her calm, matter-of-fact attitude, her lies to police, and her clubbing with friends after her daughter was allegedly kidnapped, all raise plenty of red flags.

There has been speculation that Casey sold her daughter. We believe if the girl had been sold, Casey would have already given that information up just to get out of jail. We can only believe the worst has happened.

Q: Do investigators have as little to go on as it appears?

A: Trust us when we tell you that investigators are not giving out all the information. That’s a strategy detectives use. Sometimes you withhold information so people will come forward with everything they know. People are often scared but if some evidence is withheld, especially in an emotional case like this, the burden will start weighing on the person who knows something.

Investigators are looking at every credit card receipt and every cell phone call Casey made after her daughter disappeared. Every time she made a call, there’s a record of her location based on cell phone towers. If she made calls or bought anything on her credit card from an odd remote place, then that gives investigators more clues to what happened.

Q: What does Casey Anthony's behavior suggest to you?

A: Casey Anthony’s completely cold, matter-of-way she discusses her missing baby girl is a disturbing clue not just to any homicide detective but to any normal person. In our experience, this can only mean two things. She is extremely mentally ill, which we do not believe is the case, or she is responsible for what happened to her daughter.

We’ve interviewed parents who killed their kids, and we’ve interviewed parents whose kids were actually kidnapped. There is a huge difference. The killer parents speak cold, calmly, matter-of-factly and are worried more about themselves more than their children. That fits Casey. The only time we've seen her cry is for herself at her bond hearing (shown right). If killer parents do appear upset, you can tell the emotions are not sincere, but in this case Casey isn’t even faking concern. Her hateful phone calls from jail with friends and family highlight her selfishness. She never once during the 13-minute phone call expresses concern for her Caylee—only anger that she had been arrested.

One of us worked with a special F.B.I. task force in June involving a Texas dad who killed his two children but had reported them missing. The dad, Randy Sylvester, waited six hours to report the kids’ “abduction” to police. As Sylvester discussed his missing children, he was calm and matter-of-fact. He led investigators on wild goose chases to ponds and lakes.

After a week of lies, investigators got a somewhat controversial community activist—"Quanell X"—involved. He was able to get the suspect to lead investigators to the bodies. Some people might criticize investigators for bringing in a controversial figure. But we believe you do what it takes to find missing kids and prosecute the killer. When no one else could establish rapport with this father, the activist could. In Florida, the police need someone to help them establish rapport with Casey unless evidence solves the case.

Q: The latest pictures show Casey Anthony clubbing with friends one week after her daughter was “kidnapped.” What does that tell you?

A: This shows us the child was a burden to her and interfered with her lifestyle. When you see suspects enjoying life so soon after a tragedy, especially with a child missing, it almost always means they are guilty.

We worked a case in the early '90s where a father and two sons were killed in an upper-middle class suburb of Houston. The night of the murders, the “grieving” woman who lost her husband and sons was acting weird. She was drinking and cutting up with neighbors. Her behavior was not appropriate for someone who just lost her three immediate family members. A year later, the mother married her tennis coach. All evidence pointed to a murder-for-hire. Unfortunately, we never got the evidence to prosecute her. The woman later died of alcoholism. We believe her guilty conscience killed her.

Q: What should detectives look for?

A: Mistakes, slip-ups, telling inconsistencies. Many murderers are so vain and narcissistic they think they are smarter than everyone else. Most often, they make a mistake through physical evidence or something they said. We believe the investigators in Florida are carefully getting Casey Anthony’s friends to recount every word she said to them in recent months.

What her friends say about how Casey was acting while she was conducting “her own investigation” will be a major clue. She may have told a friend that her life would be a lot easier if she didn’t have a daughter. That would be compelling evidence to a jury. It’s part of the puzzle.

Q: What do you make of the 911 calls?

A: Those initial 911 calls to police by the grandmother are instructive about the family. Is the grandmother that naive? Her daughter (Casey) had lied to her for a month about her grandbaby Caylee, but during the first call, Grandma wants Casey arrested for stealing her car and her money? . . . Then Grandma frantically calls back and tells the dispatcher "it smells like there’s been a dead body in the damn car."

As homicide detectives, we have smelled hundreds of dead bodies. We can tell you that the smell of a dead body is unmistakable. Once you’ve smelled it, you know it’s not a decaying animal or "rotten pizza." Death's smell is unique and unforgettable.

Last year, our homicide squad solved a murder where a man confessed to killing his girlfriend and then barbecuing her body. Neighbors described his “barbecue” as the most foul odor they’ve ever smelled. Detectives found plenty of evidence that Tynesha Stewart, an intelligent 19-year-old freshman engineering student, had been mutilated in the house, dismembered. After all, you can’t barbecue bones.

As for the trunk of the car in the Anthony case, the sheriff’s spokesperson said in his first statements that forensics found a blood stain, dirt, and hair in the trunk consistent with the child's hair. The investigators are playing their cards close to the vest, as they should, and not releasing much information.

Q: What if investigators never find Caylee?

A: It’s not impossible to prosecute a case without a body, but sometimes it takes patience. We’ve done it successfully. In the case of beautiful 24-year-old Tracy Jo Shine, we never found her body because the killer cut it into pieces and destroyed it in barrels of acid. It was 1987, and we didn’t have the advanced DNA testing we have now. We confiscated the refrigerator that we believed the suspect used in some way. We later determined he used it to move the body before he dismembered it.

A decade later we reopened the case. DNA testing confirmed the victim’s DNA was on the back part of the refrigerator on the wiring harness. Her DNA was not found anywhere else in that refrigerator because the boyfriend-killer had cleaned it thoroughly except for that wire. The killer is sitting in prison today.

Q: What's it going to take to crack this case?

A: We are confident the detectives in Orlando will solve this case and determine what happened to Casey. If we were questioning Casey Anthony, we would try to keep her talking about anything. She’s defensive. She has been watching the news and she knows the nation believes she is guilty. A strong-arm approach with her would shut her down and make her more defensive.

The public might not understand this but we would approach Casey in a friendly, "we want to help you" manner. It takes incredible patience with lying suspects like Casey. The first thing you need to do in an interview is establish rapport. Confrontational methods rarely work. The key reason we’ve successfully secured so many confessions is extreme patience.

Often we say “We know you did it, but we know it was a mistake. We just need to know why.” If they curse and deny it, we must stay calm and friendly. A great homicide detective exercises extreme discipline and never loses his or her cool with the suspect. We’ve often stayed up straight for twenty-four hours questioning suspects we knew were guilty of murder.

Q: If Casey is not "extremely mentally ill" . . . could she still be a sociopath?

A: We’ve dealt with sociopaths. They don’t have any feelings for other people. Casey seems to have no conscience in her daughter’s situation. If Casey’s story were true, she should be feeling very guilty for leaving her daughter with a babysitter who would kidnap the child. A normal mother would blame herself for even a kidnapping. The public hasn't seen a morsel of guilt or remorse for supposedly leaving her child with the “kidnapper.”

Sociopaths are known for having an abundance of charm and wit. Casey was a cheerleader in high school (pictured left)—a social, outgoing girl. The pictures of her in the bar show her outgoing nature. Yet the photos also reveal she has no moral conscience for the well-being of her child.

A homicide detective always does a background on the family. Casey’s mother’s behavior alone sets off big warning bells (pictured below smiling and running from media after visiting daughter in jail last week). She goes onto news programs and thinks she can use the public’s airwaves how she sees fit. She shows arrogance and refuses to answer questions about her own daughter’s involvement.

We believe Casey is not a real mother. There are evil people out there and they do evil things—things that are unimaginable to most normal people. We believe the investigators will prove Casey Anthony is a beautiful, sociopathic monster.

Read more about the careers of Legendary Detectives Fikaris and Wedgeworth below in our Mystery Man column promo. Make sure to click on their Biographical Video.

Tweet

MYSTERY "MEN" - ON CRACKING CASEY ANTHONY

????????????

Just who are these unmasked men? . . . No "mystery" in our Mystery Man feature this time. There's enough mystery surrounding the subject of this week's column: the disappearance of Florida tot Caylee Anthony. Detectives in the investigation are keeping mum, so we put our own team on the case. We just couldn't wait to run this piece on a story as timely as our guest contributors, two veteran homicide detectives, are timeless.

For our last Mystery Man, Women in Crime Ink was proud to feature a Houston homicide investigator. (You can still read that powerful piece here.) If Houston were at the center of the crime universe, the territory of tomorrow's guest contributors is the galaxy in which Space City resides: Harris County, the third largest county in the United States, and the nation's most deadly.

Detectives Roger Wedgeworth and Harry Fikaris are homicide legends with reputations for coaxing confessions and cracking cases together, as a team. In modern-day Texas, Wedgeworth and Fikaris are as inseparable and formidable at crime-solving as Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday were at settling injustices the Old West-way. In cold cases alone—the toughest crimes to solve—this duo put more than forty murderers and two serial killers behind bars. Those violent offenders had gone free until our Mystery Men took over each case and took the killers off the streets. WCI's Kelly Siegler wrote a story on one of their cases she prosecuted. Another murderer they caught was sadistic serial killer Danny Paul Bible, who killed three women and a baby and lived free for 20 long years—and roamed as many states—until Wedgeworth and Fikaris caught up with him in Louisiana and got him to admit to the slayings. Fellow detectives at the Harris County Sheriff's Office all agree that this pair can get almost anyone to confess.

Our guys have been profiled on A&E numerous times, Court TV, PEOPLE magazine, Texas Monthly, Discovery Channel, Biography Channel, Cold Case Files, and newspapers too numerous to name.

And our contributors are too legendary not to name, so we wasted no time in cluing you in on who we landed. Women in Crime Ink asked these major league homicide detectives to tell us what they think of jailed mom Casey Anthony. We hope you enjoy their insights into the Florida case that has gripped, baffled, and angered people across the nation. Watch our guys in action in the video clip below (narrated by WCI's Broadcast Journalist Cynthia Hunt!) and tomorrow read their thoughts on cracking Casey.

Video, picture, and Harris County Sheriff's Office Web site www.hcso.hctx.net courtesy of www.atgnat.com

Tweet

Homicide: A Career in Death

by Sgt. Eric Mehl

I stood in the hallway of a luxury hotel on the north side of Houston. It was late and I was tired. I carried with me an empty clipboard and I was wearing a ball cap emblazoned with the hotel logo. I knocked on the door directly in front of me.

In a loud and clear voice, I announced, “Engineering!”

I knew the man who would answer my knock had, several hours earlier, beaten an elderly woman to death with an ax. We had come to this particular hotel on a hunch that he might be there. An inquiry made at the front desk confirmed our suspicion. The dead woman was registered at the hotel. In fact, according to the hotel records, she had rented two rooms. After she had been murdered.

Hotel room doors can be difficult to breach. Any delay at the door could give the killer time to arm or barricade himself. Adding to the predicament was that the rooms rented by the killer were first-floor lobby rooms. Hotel patrons would be put at risk if we couldn’t take him quickly and quietly.

A plan was developed for him to open the door for us. The real hotel engineer cut off the electricity to the rooms the killer had rented. We waited for the suspect to call the front desk and lodge a complaint. He didn’t bother. So the front desk clerk called him and told him an “engineer” was on the way to restore the power in his rooms.

Now, standing at the door, I heard the privacy lock being disengaged from the inside. My heart began to pound in anticipation of what was to come. My right elbow rested against my .45 caliber pistol, holstered and hidden from view. It would be of little use this night.

The door swung open and there, standing in front of me, was the man who had taken an ax to an old lady. His size alone was daunting—he stood over six feet and weighed at least 220. Since he thought I was there to restore his electricity, he seemed genuinely happy to see me.

Trust me. In about one second he wouldn’t be quite so pleased.

I charged like an angry linebacker on steroids. At the point of impact, he let out a screech similar to a little girl's upon seeing her first spider. He crumbled when faced with someone comparable in size and strength. An old lady I’m not. It was over in seconds. The murderer was sitting on the floor in handcuffs and no one had been hurt. It was a successful execution of the arrest warrant.

Just Another Day at the Office

This is my world as a homicide detective. I have to admit, I’m addicted to the work.

Nobody enjoys a good murder mystery more than I do. The one where I’m standing among the carnage left in the wake of a fresh kill. Making those decisions in the first few critical hours that can mean the difference between bringing a killer to justice and knowing that he's out there unidentified. The stakes are high and the pressure is on. Moving quickly as the leads develop and staying with your case, regardless of fatigue, is mandatory. The work is dirty, demanding, challenging, and frustrating. I’m in my element. I can’t imagine having chosen a better profession.

I was a 28-year-old patrol sergeant when I was asked to apply to the Homicide Division of a large metropolitan police department. Now, more than twenty years later, with more than 500 homicide scenes behind me, I’m still there. I was warned early on not to stay too long.

“Promote out,” I was advised, “and become part of management.”

I didn’t heed the warning.

It might take only one murder case to cement your future. Mine came early in my homicide career. She was a 75-year-old woman who had been at home when she was beaten to death with a brick. Her name was Wilma. The force used against her was so tremendous that the brick broke in half. The killer then tied bound her by the neck, to a support column in her kitchen. Her legs were tied to the refrigerator door. After using her washing machine to clean the blood from his clothing, the killer stole most everything of value she owned. He had a thirty-six hour lead on me.

Two days later, I was in a small police department in Mississippi taking the murderer’s confession. He held nothing back:

There was some bricks on the side of the house and I grabbed one. . . . I walked inside. . . . She had her back to me at the kitchen table. . . . I raised my arm up and struck her on top of the head real hard. . . . She fell forward, toward the window, screaming for help. . . . I hit her so hard with the brick that it broke the brick. . . . She was laying on the ground in the kitchen and I picked up the broken piece of the brick and started pounding her with it. . . . She wasn't really moving at the time. . . . She was breathing a little bit. . . . I searched the area for a rope or something that I could tie around her neck and choke her with it.

Wilma’s murderer was buried with evidence. He had left his finger- and palm-prints at the murder scene. Bloody footprints on the kitchen floor had been made by the shoes he was wearing when he was arrested. I tracked down the stolen items he had pawned or otherwise sold. I had the ribbon of a typewriter found in his possession transcribed to prove it belonged to Wilma.

After both sides had rested their cases at trial, the defense lawyer reminded the jury that he had informed them, in his opening statement, that the evidence against his client would be, “overwhelming.”

It was—and I was hooked.

Priceless Benefits

People will often ask how I can endure the constant barrage of death and tragedy. I’m not sure it’s easily explained. In the end, it’s the murder victims themselves who keep me coming back for more. Especially the most vulnerable among us, the very young and the very old. Someone has to stand and speak for them since they can no longer speak for themselves.

The work can, at times, take a toll. I remember a two-year period when 1,288 people where murdered in Houston during 1990 and 1991. The scenes came so fast I found myself standing in the middle of the next homicide scene before I could complete the last one. Or the one before that.

There was a three-month period during that time that was especially troubling, at least for me. During those three months—April, May, and June—I stood over the bodies of seven murdered children. Six had been shot to death in two separate incidents. The seventh was a 4-year-old girl who had been raped and beaten to death with a tree limb. Her name was Monique. Her killer had left her in a wooded area. It took us five days in the Bayou City's merciless heat and humidity to find her.

Imagine the sight.

Secretly, I hoped people would stop killing children. It was not to be. A little boy named Datrick was beaten to death one night, by his father, because he refused to eat his spinach. He also dared to give his father, a preacher, an evil look. His father told us he refused to have such an undisciplined child. The preacher no longer has that concern.

Then there was Floyd. Floyd was two years old and must have done something incredibly terrible. I say this because his mother decided to punish him by placing him in a bathtub of scalding water. The injuries were textbook. She decided against medical treatment—Children’s Protective Services might take him away. It took Floyd ten days to die. Ten agonizing days.

When I arrived at that scene, Floyd’s mother and her boyfriend were sitting in their living room watching television. A patrol officer motioned me to a bedroom. There was nothing in the bedroom, except Floyd. He was lying on the floor against a wall. His skin, from the waist down, looked like pink, green, and yellow bubbling wax. Infection had set in. It was absolutely horrific. Floyd died in that bare bedroom all alone. I’m sure death was a relief—Floyd didn’t have to hurt anymore.

So there it is. Floyd, Monique, Datrick, Wilma, and the hundreds of other murder victims who came after them have kept me in Homicide for so many years. Though dead, they were provided with a voice and they were heard, albeit in a courtroom. Someone, whom they had never met, was there to say that what they endured was wrong and that the people who hurt them have to be held accountable.

Life After Death

My days as a policeman are now numbered. Death is cruel and plays no favorites. It visited my home twenty-one months ago. Seeing so much death in my life has numbed me to a certain extent. But nothing in my experience prepared me for having to tell my 7-year-old daughter that her mom would never again be coming home.

Today, I try to manage a homicide caseload along with the school and social schedule of my daughter, now nine. Time constraints prevent me from giving either the proper attention. People tell me I’m too young to retire. I disagree. My daughter has already lost her mother to heart disease. She won’t lose me to my job.

The big city police department can make you feel like you’re nothing more than an employee number and a seniority date. I will be easily replaced when I leave. My hope is that the young sergeant who replaces me and walks into the Homicide Division for the first time acquires a passion for the work. A passion I’ve carried with me for the past two decades.

Eric Mehl is a sergeant with the Homicide Division of the Houston Police Department, where he has worked for twenty-seven years. He was one of two detectives asked to form the Cold Case Unit, which he now heads. Sgt. Mehl lives in Houston with his daughter. Read more about his career here.

Tweet

Mystery Man - Clue Box

Time for our next Mystery Man. We hope you enjoyed the four-part series we featured over the Fourth of July holiday. Our next guest contributor is a big-city homicide detective from the Death Penalty capital of the nation: Houston, Texas. This investigator was one of two detectives selected to form the department's Cold Case Unit. Since his unit's expansion, he has been able to add detectives like WCI's Connie Park.

Twenty-seven years ago this summer, our Mystery Man joined the Houston Police Department. He was promoted to sergeant in the late 1980s, and has spent most of his career since then in the Homicide Division. When he joined HPD in 1981, the Murder Squad was dealing with the surge of violence of the late '70s, when the team of homicide investigators had more business than they could handle. On the two manual typewriters detectives used to take statements, the rollers only stopped moving for as long as it took for the next in line to sit and load a clean sheet of paper.

Investigators were typing statements on computers by the time this Mystery Man arrived. The most notorious statement he took was on videotape: the confession of Andrea Yates, who drowned her five children in 2001. Though it's difficult to imagine, one desperate parent murdering multiple children would not be the only quintuple homicide he investigated.

Ten years earlier, he stood over the bodies of four children and their father, a distraught man who murdered everyone because his wife had sued for divorce and asked the court to grant him sole custody of the children. What the detective remembered most was this: After purchasing a .45 semiautomatic, the father had driven the kids to K-Mart for new clothes and a Polaroid. At home, he took a photo of the children, wrote a note to his wife that the picture would be the last time she saw them, and fired a bullet into each child's head before ending his own life the same way.

Those mass murders are but two of the several hundred cases he's investigated. Somewhere in there, he met a Harris County prosecutor he wanted to share his life with, and together they had a beautiful daughter. Over the years, his cases have taken him all over the nation, though he's not one to boast. "My killers seldom run to the garden spots of the US," he said. "I've awakened in such places as Hackensack, New Jersey; Pascagoula, Mississippi; Bakersfield, California; and Monroe, Lousiana." Tomorrow, he'll share some of his memorable Houston cases. You shouldn't need any other clues to convince you that this Mystery Man is not to be missed. Check him out here tomorrow.

Tweet

Mystery Man:Kerry Max Cook (Part 4 of 4)

For Independence Day, Women in Crime Ink presents a four-part series written by Kerry Max Cook, a man who struggled for twenty-two years to regain his freedom. This is the fourth installment. Read Part 1, Part 2 , and Part 3 .

by Kerry Max Cook

After I’d lost everything that mattered to me most in the world my freedom, my self-respect, the person I loved the most, I came face to face with the fragility of humankind. And I dedicated my life to forgiveness: of myself, of those I had wronged, and those who had wronged me. I began living the truth that hate only hurts the person who is doing the hating.

In my heart I built a shrine that represented the love I had for Doyle Wayne and I promised him–and myself–that I wouldn’t give up, no matter what.

In defiance of my lawyers, I resumed a media campaign to the press. My lawyers had strenuously advised me against this, saying the press would distort my story and use it against me.

But I had nothing to lose now.

I’d been in prison for over ten years now, with no progress. I’d seen what happens when you let other people control your destiny. It was time I controlled my own, completely.

I wrote to David Hanners, a reporter at the Dallas Morning News. I told him that if he found anything untrue about my story, I would voluntarily walk into the execution chamber to be executed.

My persistence with David Hanners and the Dallas Morning News produced a gigantic break by bringing me and my story out of the darkness and into the light with the headline “Inmate Was Railroaded" splashed across the front pages.

For the next two years I worked exclusively with David Hanners, and this alliance produced over 40 front-page stories, such as “Convicted Man Called Innocent,” “Key Evidence in Cook Case said to be False" (the aging of the fingerprint) and many, many more.

This helped save my life.

My second break came when I persuaded Jim McCloskey (left) of Centurion Ministries to take on my case.

Centurion is a New Jersey-based, non-profit organization that investigates an inmate’s claim of innocence, and if they find evidence to support the inmate’s claims, they hire an attorney and go into the field to collect the hidden or undeveloped evidence.

I had written Jim McCloskey before, but had only been sent a form letter.

Armed with the Dallas Morning News’ front-page investigative stories, I stuffed an envelope full and again wrote Jim McCloskey.

This time, Jim McCloskey wrote back:

“Before I commit to any case, I require an honest, detailed account of your life and a detailed description of your conviction. An innocent man named Matt Connor once wrote us 60 pages. I know that is a lot, and that was an extraordinary case. I look forward to reading your story.”

All during the day, and well into the night I worked on my response. Finally, I wrote:

“Dear Mr. McCloskey: Enclosed please find my 61-page autobiography. I am one page more innocent than Matt Connor was.”

Jim McCloskey took my case. He hired a Houston attorney named Paul Nugent (on left with Kerry and attorney Scott Howe to his right) and for ten grueling years, it was a David and Goliath-like fight, but we prevailed as a united front.

Paul, Jim, and the Dallas Morning News literally saved my life.

So . . . who DID rape and murder Linda Jo Edwards? Twenty-two years lter, a law-enforcement crime lab discovered semen on a long overlooked piece of evidence and tested it in an effort to answer that question.

The DNA belonged to none other than the original suspect–Linda’s married ex-lover, James Mayfield.

But police and prosecutors had so corrupted their case against him in their blind pursuit of me for over two decades, it made it impossible to legally charge him–even in the face of his genetic fingerprints at the crime scene.

Those who prosecuted me were politicians first. They never admitted their mistake. The truth in this case was never as important as their careers. And their careers blossomed.

District Attorney Jack Skeen was nominated “Prosecutor of the Year” by the Texas State Bar, which is made up of county and district attorneys. Jack Skeen is now a District Judge overseeing justice in Tyler, Texas.

Doug Collard, the policeman who started it all by aging my fingerprint and making it the killer’s calling card? Years later, Collard told a fingerprint licensing board—in addressing a complaint filed against him by a fellow member, after the Dallas Morning News publicized his perjury regarding the "aging" of my fingerprint—he shouldn’t be held responsible for his perjury because the District Attorney’s Office made him do it. He finished out his career with honors and retired a few years ago.

It’s worth noting that Detective Collard’s Response to the Complaint filed against him was deliberately hidden while prosecutors fought up the appellate ladder to have me executed.

District Attorney Jack Skeen argued all the way up to the United States Supreme Court that the guilt of the accused was beyond any doubt because Doug Collard testified that the my fingerprint could only have been left on the patio door of the victim at the time she was raped and murdered, making it the “killer’s calling card.”

I did finally get an apology but it didn’t come from the police or the prosecutors–even in the face of DNA exoneration. Ironically it came from the only person involved in my case that had the courage to admit he really was a criminal: Shyster Jackson.

The most significant lesson I learned serving 22 years of a wrongful conviction is the power of forgiveness. The ability to forgive gave me the power to be free.

I was imprisoned on the worst death row in America and now I was free. Death row might have had my body, but it didn’t have my mind. As Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. “

I never let go of mine.

Read Kerry's complete story in his book, CHASING JUSTICE: My Story of Freeing Myself After Two Decades on Death Row for a Crime I Didn't Commit

Tweet