Oba Chandler

On June 4, 1989 a fisherman discovered a body floating in the water in the Tampa Bay. After the authorities arrived they found two more bodies within two miles of each other. The bodies had been found with their hands and feet bound. There was a rope around each neck and the other end was connected to a concrete block. Autopsies would show that the victims had been alive when they were thrown into the water, likely from a boat. They would be identified as thirty-six year old Joan Rogers, her seventeen year old daughter, Michelle and her fourteen year old daughter Christie. The mother and her two daughters lived in Ohio but had gone on vacation to Florida to escape some drama that had been going on in their lives lately. That drama led to suspicions but in the end authorities discovered it was a chance encounter with a stranger that had led to their deaths.

On May 26, 1989 Joan and her daughters left their home in Ohio. Husband and father, Hal stayed home to work at the family farm. In recent months the family had faced some turmoil. Hal's brother, John was serving time in prison for rape. He had also been accused of molesting his niece, Michelle but the charges were dropped when Michelle decided she would not testify against her uncle. Hal had even bailed his brother out of jail after the allegations were made. He would later say he had done so because he made a promise to his family that he would. The family apparently lived in a small town and the gossip surrounding the sexual assault of Michelle was a bit overwhelming. They thought it was a good idea to get away from the area for a while so Joan took the girls to Florida. There was some indication that Hal's parents lived in Florida but the women did not stay with them, or at least were not when they disappeared on June 1^st.

The Rogers' car was found at a local boat dock. Inside the car was a pamphlet on which someone had handwritten directions. Investigators would come to believe that the women had become lost on June 1^st going from Orlando to Willshire and decided to take an extra day in Tampa. Inside their hotel room it looked as if Joan had written down a description of a boat. The room seemed undisturbed as it looked as if the family had simply left with plans to return.

Investigators had few leads in the course of their investigation. It was originally believed that the crime was committed by more than one person considering there were three victims and they had to be subdued at the same time. This theory was shown on the popular television show Unsolved Mysteries. In 1992 law enforcement decided to try something that had never been done before in the United States. They posted a photocopy of the pamphlet that had been found in Joan's car. They believed the handwritten directions had been written by the killer.

Tips began rolling in with people claiming to know who the handwriting belonged to. One of those tips came from a woman who was the former neighbor of Oba Chandler. Chandler was known to do “handyman” work and she had a work order he had written. Handwriting analysis was done and thought that it was a match. Investigators looked more into Chandler and discovered that he had a boat just as had been described on the paper found in the hotel room. Other evidence came together and on September 24, 1992 Chandler was arrested.

Chandler went on trial in October of 1994. Aside from the things mentioned above, prosecutors had other evidence. They discovered a palm print on the pamphlet that had the directions written on it and it was said to be a match to Chandler. They also believed that this was not only not the first time Oba Chandler had committed murder, but not the first time he had attacked a woman. Chandler had a long list of arrests both as a juvenile and as an adult. As an adult he had served time for crimes such as burglary, kidnapping and armed robbery. One of the most important witnesses would be a woman named Judy Blair. Judy Blair lived in Canada and like the Rogers women she was on vacation in Florida. She and her friend had met Oba Chandler by chance on May 15^th, just a few weeks before investigators believe he murdered the Rogers women. According to Blair, Chandler had invited both she and her friend to his boat for a ride that evening. Her friend had decided not to go but Judy Blair had taken him up on his offer. While on the boat she claimed that Chandler had raped her, but instead of killing her as he would later do, he simply returned to the shore. Judy Blair reported the rape to the police and provided them with a sketch of the man as she did not know his name. A neighbor (possibly the same who saw the handwriting) believed that Chandler looked like the sketch and when all the dots were connected Judy Blair identified him as her attacker.

Prosecutors were able to determine that Chandler was in his boat in the Tampa Bay on the night of June 1, 1989. They cited three calls from ship to shore made that night from his boat to his home in the time frame they believed the murders had occurred. This was something Chandler could not dispute and either through interviews with investigators, or when he took the stand in his own defense against the advice of his lawyers, he claimed that he was fishing alone. He alleged that the boat engine would not start and that he contacted both the Coast Guard and Florida Marine Patrol but were told they were too busy to help. Records were checked and neither the Coast Guard or the Marine Patrol had any notification that Chandler had made any such calls.

Prosecutors believed that Chandler noticed the Ohio license plates on the Rogers' vehicle and used that to contact them. Chandler himself had been born in Ohio and spent much of his childhood there. The women were last seen about 7:30 that night at the hotel restaurant. It is believed that they met Chandler on his boat between 8:30 and 9:00. It is believed that all three were dead by three the next morning.

While the defense argued that Chandler was innocent and often brought up the early theory that investigators believed that more than one person was involved, the jury did not seem to agree. They found Chandler guilty on three counts counts of capital murder. On November 4, 1994 Oba Chandler was sentenced to death.

The state of Florida executed Oba Chandler on November 15, 2011. In the seventeen years between his conviction and his execution it was said that Chandler never had even one visitor. He continued to claim his innocence in the murders of the Joan Rogers and her daughters. He did admit to the rape against Judy Blair but claimed that it began as consensual sex until they were in the middle of the act and never admitted to it being a rape. It also seems that he never confessed to any other crimes. Investigators never believed that the murders of the Rogers women was his first murder because he was bold enough to kidnap three victims at once. Science has yet to prove that he committed a crime before June 1, 1989 but it has proven that it was not his last.

On November 27, 1990 the body of Ivelisse Berrios-Beguerisse was found in Coral Springs Florida. Chandler was suspected of her murder but it appears that he denied being involved. On February 14, 2014, two and a half years after he was executed, authorities announced that DNA evidence had conclusively proven that he was the murderer of Berrios-Beguerisse.