True Crime Stories

On the night of December 30, 1993 Sylvia Mosier returned to her Taylorsville Utah apartment about twenty minutes after nine and her life was never the same. Sylvia, a single mother, raising fourteen year old Christopher had just been trying to make ends meet. To supplement her job at a local restaurant she had also taken up babysitting. On that day she was babysitting for Linda Johnson who had a two month old son. Linda had been scheduled to pick the baby up around five that night which worked out great since Sylvia needed to leave a little before six to put in three hours at her other job. But, Linda had called and was going to be later than expected, putting in extra hours at her own job. Christopher had offered to watch the baby until either he was picked up by one of his parents or Sylvia returned home from work. Sylvia called a little after seven to check on things and Christopher had indicated that things were fine. Christopher's grandmother called him...

I love hearing about cases that have been solved after many years, or decades. However, the problem with these cases is that the older they are, the more difficult it is to get all of the information and make sure that information is correct. Such is the case in the death of Sandra Howard in 1975. So, the question lies for me whether to tell the story at all without all of the facts. This is a case though that I have seen on crime shows over the years and while many murders are heartbreaking and senseless, this one seems more so for many reasons. It is one of those cases in which a simple sentence reminds you exactly what case it was. In this case it is the story that Sandra Howard was a newlywed and every month on their anniversary she and her new husband, David, shared a piece of wedding cake. They made it nearly five months but on this particular anniversary, David was going to be out of town. He took some cake with him and while they would not be together when they ate...

If you are a regular reader of my blog you know that I like to see appeal records to get information because I feel they are the best source of getting all the information that was presented at a trial to prove someone's guilt. I want to know what evidence was presented at the trial and see how a jury came to the conclusion that they did. I have not seen an appeal on this case as of yet and so I am still left with those questions. This does not mean that I do not believe in the jury's verdict or even that I think the defendant is innocent in any way, in fact it appears that the defense conceded that the defendant was involved in the death of his wife although there was still a trial. Sometime in early 1982 twenty-nine year old Amy Hurst moved from Michigan to New Port Richey Florida with her husband William. My research indicates that her two children from a previous marriage were living with her until the move when they went to live with their father. When her m...

This is a case that is local to the area in which I now live. I did not live here at the time so it was not one that I was familiar with. Generally one of the benefits to researching a crime in this area is the fact that there is a database that has newspaper articles that were published. However, it was not as helpful in this case because although the crime happened in 1989 the database becomes sporadic from about 1990 and they do not currently keep that up to date. This meant I was limited to the information I could find elsewhere for the most part. Not only did this disappoint me for blogging purposes but also investigative purposes. I have a lot of questions about this case and I was hoping the local newspaper articles could help. On August 1, 1989 Debbie Thompson was found beaten, strangled, stabbed and naked in the front room of her Evansville Indiana apartment. Her husband had just left the day before for his two week National Guard training. Examiners woul...

Often after I place a name on my list I will put something to give me an idea as to what kind of case it is.  Sometimes it will simply say "spouse" or "neighbor."  Next to Todd Campbell's name I had put "acquitted-Fla-cold case."  I was excited when I saw it was next because it already sounded different than those I have done recently.  As I began my research I became more intrigued.  In fact, I was so intrigued that I have already started here before finishing my research, something that only happens on the rare occasion.  I began reading about the case and saw that there had been a DNA match to Todd Campbell, to which led to his charges in the murder of Vickie Long who had been found dead in 1984 and yet despite this DNA match Campbell was acquitted in his 2012 trial.   It is not unusual to hear cases in which the defense argues semen DNA found as coming from consensual sex.  However, it is unusual to hear that the defense actually worked whic...

Going into this case doing the research I thought this was a pretty cut and dry case to blog about.  As soon as I started researching I learned that may not be the case and although the crime was committed in 1994 and Patricia Rorrer was convicted in 1998, as late as 2015 her lawyer were continuing to argue about possibly tampered evidence.  So, I dug a little deeper than I had really planned to in the beginning and found myself with more questions than answers. On December 15, 1994 Joanne Katrinak and her three month old son Alex, of Lehigh Valley Pennsylvania,  were supposed to meet her mother in law to go shopping for the day.  She never showed and never answered the phone.  When Joanne's husband, Andrew, returned home they were not there either.  He found the basement door open and removed from the hinges and the phone lines cut.  He called the police. Joanne's car would be found in a parking lot near the couple's home but neither Joanne or Alex ...

I often spend my days throughout the week watching (mainly rerun episodes) shows like Dateline and 48 Hours  to find interest in cases I would like to discuss here.  Many times they are stories I remember hearing about in the past and sometimes they are even episodes I have seen but it has been some time so I like a refresher.  When it comes to this case, after watching the show I had not recalled seeing the story before.  This is a story of murder, as most of my blog are about but the part of this story that grabbed me the most was about survival.   In so many cases in which a perpetrator has left a survivor in their wake it is the survivor that helps solve the case of so many others.  Look at the case of Ted Bundy.  It was a survivor that was able to tell her story to get a description of the man as well as the story he had fabricated to get her.  This case is a bit different in that aspect. It was the diligence of officers in anothe...

I have often heard prosecutors say that they do not get to pick their witnesses and when you are dealing with criminals, you are more than likely to have criminals as your witnesses.  Before forensics obviously witnesses were all that authorities had.  Obviously there are going to be those who lie in hopes of either getting away with something they did or to gain something in another area. Over the decades authorities have learned, or at least most should have, that even the most innocent eye witness can be flawed and so to rely on this is not always a good thing. On April 4, 1989 a 911 call was received from a woman named Kim Hallock in Mims Florida.  She said that she had met up with an ex boyfriend, Charles "Skip" Flynn Jr. at a park sometime after 11 pm to talk and that they had been held up by a "black man" who then kidnapped them, took them to an orange grove and then proceeded to shoot Charles.  She had gotten away but Charles was still in the orange grove...