True Crime Stories

This is bit of a strange case. In some ways it is much like the Susan Smith case in where one of the people spearheading the search for the missing is the one responsible for their death. In other ways I have to be left wondering about possible mental issues involving the defendant in this case. The latter may never be resolved as I am one of those who believes that no matter what position each side in a case takes they can always find an “expert” to agree with them. I have seen many cases in which one side or another have all but “expert shopped” until they did find such a person. There have been at least a few cases in which the prosecution was “caught” per se doing this. Now, before I get any further I should state that whether I believe the defendant in this case has mental issues or not does not change the fact that I believe he was responsible for the crime he was convicted of committing. Although he confessed to the police and they seemingly had the evidenc...

Cases such as this one are difficult to blog about for me. Several things come into play here but no matter what legal or medical outcome is made in the end there is still a death and a family mourning a loved one. As a reader of my blog you know that I am as interested and fascinated about the crimes as I am about the legal process and how things are done. Guilty or Innocent there are rules and laws to follow and there must be evidence to prove someone committed a crime. This was not a crime in which the death penalty was sought but I have often stated that it is those sorts of cases that I believe there should be absolutely no doubt of the defendant's guilt before imposing the death penalty. In those cases especially, but in all cases it is imperative that a proper investigation is conducted. Then things are not done properly not only can it delay or impede justice for a victim and their family, it can also cause undue stress, among other things to a susp...

This is an odd case for me. It is one of those cases that ran cold for twenty years. It is also a case in which prosecutors arrested and charged a suspect some five years after the crime only to drop the charges saying there was insufficient evidence. When this happens it makes the job of the prosecutor that much harder because the defense has a “fall guy.” They do not always have to say that the previous suspect is the actual perpetrator, but they can simply argue that the prosecutor and law enforcement had been so convinced that person was the suspect that they had gone as far as to arrest someone and charge them, only to decide the person was either innocent or as this case stated, there was not enough evidence to move forward. Jason Tibbs was convicted in the murder of Rayna Rison, twenty-one years after her murder. He had been an early suspect when Rayna first disappeared March 26, 1993 after his class ring was found in her car. At the time authorities believed T...

This crime is one of the most heinous that I have come across, not necessarily because of the crime itself, but because of the relationship between the victims and the perpetrator. Even still one of the things that shocks me is how the justice system handled things inside the court. For over two decades many states have required those convicted of sex offenses to register with the local police department upon their release from prison and have restrictions they must follow. In 2006 the federal government it mandated that states have a registry, which all did, but by their rules. There are still arguments on whether the federal rules are the “right ones,” just as there are still arguments on whether the registry itself is legal. Initially these registries were enacted to warn law enforcement and the public of the “worse of the worse” when it came to sexual crimes, especially those against children. Over the years the states have added more and more offenses to the ...

On June 25, 2006 Owensboro Kentucky resident Calvin Stoudt called 911 saying he had returned home from church to find his wife, forty-six year old Corrine dead in their home. The investigation into the crime uncovered secrets that many among friends and family of Corrine had not been made aware. When Corrine met Calvin she lived in Illinois. Her parents lived in Owensboro and after a painful divorce her father introduced her to Calvin. The two seemed to hit it off very well, at least at first and Corrine moved to Owensboro. Like Corrine, Calvin too was divorced but while she believed Calvin had only been married once before it would later be discovered that Corrine was his fourth wife. Over the years the marriage started deteriorating. For Corrine it didn't help when her parents left Kentucky and moved back to Springfield Illinois, some four hours away. Corrine had always been very involved in her church and over their years together this is one thing ...