REIGN OF INJUSTICE-David M. Beers

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the mystery surrounding her disappearance remains. Four years after she went missing, her wealthy husband Cal Harris was arrested in charge with her murder, with neither a body nor a murder weapon. Cow was shockingly tried and convicted of her murder. Then new evidence surfaced. His conviction was overturned and a new trial granted. But once again he was convicted and sentenced at twenty five years to life in prison. That conviction, too, was overturned on appeal. The saga continued as Caw went

on trial for the third time. This one ended in a mistrial. By the time Cal went on trial, the fourth time Michelle had been missing for nearly fifteen years. Defense investigator David M. Beers worked on the Cal Harris case from stuff to finish. His account, Rain of Injustice walks you through the details and events of the case never before revealed. It provides an inside view of the scandalous case, facts that you will not find elsewhere, including

why he considers Cal's story a rain of Injustice. The book that we're featuring this evening is Rain of Injustice, The Cal Harris Story with my special guest journalist, author, and special investigator, David M.

of Oligo. It's kind of nestled right in along the north side of the Susquehanna River, just west of the village in the town of Tioga, another small township. Cal Harris and his older brother Kevin owned two car dealerships. Cal owned Royal Ford on the south side of the highway and his brother Kevin owned and operated Royal Chrysler to the north. But Cal also owned another Royal Chevrolet dealership up in Courtland, New York, which is about forty

five minutes north of Oligo. They've been in business for several years. The Royal Auto Group was started by Cal's father Dwight Harris. He was a pretty popular entrepreneurial business tycoon in Tioga County, darting many business enterprises before going into the automobile business. And then when his sons, after they were educated in college or whatever, he groomed them into the automobile dealership business, and later they took over the day to day operations. So that kind of sets

the stage for what Cal was. Cal was born and raised in a kind of an upper middle class home, went to high school in vest of New York. He's a very handsome young man, very talented athlete, became a star lacrosse player, and then he went on to college. I believe he played lacrosse in college as well. He studied business and economics, and then, like I said, he

was groomed into the family automobile dealership. He was kind of thrust into the position a little prematurely after his father had a heart attack and he and he found himself supervising people who were his parents' age. So it was a little awkward for him, so he had to he had to learn the ropes rather quickly. His wife, Michelle Uh, she grew up in a kind of a lower middle class neighborhood just just west of Aligo in the little town of Tioga, UH. She was like four

years younger than Cal. H. She went to Tiga High School and then after high school she went to Morrisville UH College in New York UH. And then when she when she finished her education, she went to work for the Royal Auto Group in Oligo. And it was there that that Cal met Michelle Uh and they hit it off right away. They was like love at first sight.

She was gorgeous UH, kind of head turning, attractive, very personable, fun loving, and they hit it off immediately started dating, moved in together, and then within about four years they got married. I believe it was nineteen ninety and it was from a lakeside ceremony at a lake some lake property that Cal and his father had owned in the

town of Spencer, several miles north of Ouigo. And then after they got married, Cal built Michelle a beautiful lakeside home, half million dollars half million dollar home on the lake, and it was in a really remote area. You couldn't even see their house from the road or the road from the house. And it was two hundred and fifty acres plus of just wilderness area, most of which was all densely wooded. There were a few open fields in

the lake, of course, in a pond. UH. But they, you know, they spent a considerable amount of time, you know, entertaining family and friends, you know, UH snowmobiling, hay rides, swimming, fishing, hunting, riding ATVs uh and that that was an enjoyable part of their life. And then they uh along the way they had They had four children in a relatively short

period of time. In fact, at the time that this that Michelle disappeared, their oldest child, Taylor, was only seven, and the youngest four, Tanner, was only eighteen months old. So you can see how closely they were in age at the time. So that kind of lays the groundwork for a little bit of history on on Cal and Michelle and how they met and started living together and

then got married. And I guess I should also add that, you know, trouble started brewing in the marriage uh at some point in time, and it only got worse when Michelle discovered that Cal was having an affair. But on mandown'st to Cal, she Michelle was having an affair as well, and she had started seeing and dating a man and uh for like six months. Uh and onbeknownst to to Cal at the time, and she started going on weekend

rendezvous with him in the Poconots. They were using pin number calling cards to call each other the other to keep their relationship secret. And then at some point her this boyfriend, uh, you know, he fell head over heels for Michelle and he packed his bags. He was from philadel Yeah, he packed his bags, left his girlfriend, his family, his job, and moved up to New York and found an apartment in a job to be near Michelle, with expectations of getting married, even though that wasn't He didn't

have this Michelle did not have the same expectations. So anyway, that kind of sets the stage a little background.

It was all you know, verbal altercations. In fact, one of their adult babysitters, you know, described some of the arguments and said that, you know, Michelle could hold her own and she could be as verbally abusive to Cal as he was to her, and other people you know

said similar things. But at some point in time, actually I think it was early March or April two thousand and one, Shell decided to take a job as a waitress at a somewhat lower class bar restaurant down in Waverley, New York, which is probably a twenty minute drive for her to get to work, and she was telling family and friends that the reason she took the job was because Cal had cut her off financially, which which turned

out to be not true. You know, the records later indicated that Cal was paying her like four hundred dollars a week, plus he was still giving her a dealership car to use free free gas anytime she needed at the dealership. And we later we later learned that the real reason she took the job wasn't because she needed the money. It was because she didn't want to go home.

She didn't want to be home and argue with Cal, so she wanted to distance herself from him, plus had more time to socialize with her new boyfriend.

fun of her a little bit in conversation. But probably the most bizarre thing about that was that after she did that, it became kind of the talk of the town and U she was actually flaunting it and uh uh And at times she would she would flash her breasts in front of other men, even in public, uh, at the dealerships or in a bar and Uh. In fact, one one witness I talked to UH had actually seen her do it in front of a guy at at a bar down in Waverley. After after she got out

of work and went to this bar. She you know, she flashed her chest and he remembered scolding her for that, telling her that she was just encouraging these creeps. But that didn't stop her. Uh. And in fact, it went as far as you know, some of these men that she had flashed her breast to it also asked her if they could feel what they were like because they never felt implants before, and she let him do it.

around six point thirty from his office in Courtland. He usually works in Courtland on Tuesdays, and he'd called Barb ahead a time around five point thirty, said, I'm wrapped up here. I'll be home in about an hour, and he was, and as soon as he got home, she left, and Cal, you know, played with the kids for a while, but it was a school night, so we put in the bed about eight o'clock, and then he worked in his office for a while and then went to bed

himself around ten ten thirty. And then when he got up in the morning, he showered and got dressed for work, and he went downstairs, assuming that Michelle would be there, you know, getting the kids up and ready for school, because prior to that you had mentioned what the living arrangements were. They were still living in the same marital home while the divorce was pending. But Michelle was sleeping in the family room downstairs and Cal was sleeping in

the bedroom upstairs. So during that period of time, you know, when Michelle came home from work, she would sleep in the family room, but then she would get up and take care of her mother responsibilities regarding the children, getting

them ready for school. But when Cale went down the stairs that morning on the morning of the twelve, she wasn't there, and and he peeked out in the garage and her van was not there, so at that time he knew she had a boyfriend and she He just assumed that she was still with him and running late. But because he wanted to stay on schedule and get to work on time and get the kids to school on time, he needed some help, so he called Barb Thayer.

She wasn't scheduled to come over till later, but anyway, he called Barb Theayre like at seven in the morning and explained that Michelle hadn't come home. So Fayer agreed to come over and give them a hand. So a few minutes later, she leaves her house, comes over, and when she arrives at the end of the Harris driveway, which I mentioned earlier you can't see from the house because it's the driveways like a quarter quarter mile long. Anyway,

she stops. Michelle's van parked right in the nose of the driveway, so she stops, gets out, looks through Michelle's van. The door was on lock, the key was in the ignition, so she opens up the driver's door, looks around, and then she goes in the back, lifts up the tailgate, looks around. No sign of Michelle, so she gets back in the car and drives into the house, walks in and she's Cal. He's dressed ready for work, and she said,

you know, is Michelle Cal? She says, as Michelle home and tell says, no, I told you she didn't come home. He says, well, I just saw her van out the end of the driveway. So they both start speculating as to what might have happened. You know, did she uh stop there and and and park the car and go out with somebody else, or did she just uh wander off that They really didn't know, so anyway, finally Cal says, well, we better go get it. You better go get her van.

So he drives Barbed Player out to the end of the driveway. They both looked through the van again, and then Barbedlayer drives Michelle's van back into the house and parks it in the garage where she normally would And then they're they're looking through the van to look for the kids book bags and that type of thing to

get him ready for school. And you know, Cal makes the comment of how messy the van looked, and he said that, you know, we better get this down to the dealership where I can get it serviced, which is overdue, and and and and clean it out. It's a mess. At the time, barbed their I thought that was a little unusual under the circumstances, right, But but they didn't do that. They didn't do that.

their attorney today. I better call him. So she did. And then Uh the attorney calls the state police and and and sets up a conference call between himself and Nicky Burdick and the state police. And they explained the situation, and the attorney requested that they start a missing person case, which they did. They launched it within an hour, which is in itself, it's pretty unusual. You know, most people are told, you know, you got to wait twenty four hours. Well,

they didn't wait twenty four hours. They felt something was

wrong and they started their investigation right away. So less than an hour later, you know, two state police investigators are walking into Cal's office at his dealership to ask him some questions about about Michelle and what he could tell him, and he he cooperated with him fully talked to them for a length of time, and then he escorted them out to his house, showed him where Michelle's van was parked, and then it took him into the house and they looked through the van and then they uh,

I need to get back to work, uh, And he left them there to do their thing, and in which they did, and they towed Michelle's van back into the state police barracks so they could take a closer look, uh. And then they went back uh and interviewed Cal some more so that that kind of gives you a rough synopsis of of what what took place and and how was how it was determined that uh, Michelle was missing.

There was a call on the answering machine that he saved for them, thinking it might be helpful, and so he was very cooperative. But after he went back to work that day, they stayed there. The State police stayed there and were looking through the house and around the property, and then they started calling in for help to do more thorough search. They called the New York State Forest Rangers, they called for the helicopter, they called for divers, they

called for cadaver dogs. So there was a whole contingent of search efforts put in place to try to find Michelle. But it didn't all happen that first day. They were actually there from I'm going to say late morning until dinner time looking for Michelle, maybe six hours, and they

didn't find anything at all. So they packed up and left, and then Cal found out that they were done, so he picked up, picked up the kids, and he'd originally take him to dinner, but then he took him home and the state police were gone, so he remained at home that evening and a couple of family members showed

up to offer their support. And but the next day the police were back then and they started putting together this this massive search detail, bringing in all those entities that I just just mentioned, and then they spent the next uh It eventually led to them getting a search warrant. Originally, they were working under the written consent that Cal had given them. But then one of the forensic investigators were

actually there's a team of two. They went in to take a little closer look inside the house and they and while they were there, they found some specs of blood, tiny specs of blood on the garage, initially on the on the wall in the garage and on the entryway to the kitchen from the garage. So they halted their their assessment and applied for a search warrant, which which

is exactly what should have been done. So everybody cleared out and they they posted sentries at the door to preserve the scene.

came back positive for blood. Even though a field test is only positive for blood period it's not it could be it doesn't. It's not species specific, so it could be animal blood or human blood, so you won't know further until you test it further. But anyway, those early presumptive tests, they never photographed the areas that were tested. They never documented it, uh, which which was very unfortunate and it was kind of a violation of crime scene protocol.

But but the interesting thing was they they waited it was like four days after Michelle went missing before they started to photograph the blood well, which which was very detrimental because the whole the whole issue that came up later was the uh it's not only the volume of blood was small, but the but the age of the blood that that became crucial because there was there wasn't a sufficient volume there to suggest that somebody had been seriously injured or killed and and that so now the

age of the blood becomes important. And and they were not really able to do that, uh, to age the blood, uh because it was dry, it wasn't fresh, so there was no way to determine how old the blood was. So uh, an innocent explanation easily presented itself, but they they kind of ignored that and uh, you know, and proceeded as if that was evidence of of a crime.

him to to take a polygraph exam. And initially he responded right away, yeah, I'd be glad to, but he said, my attorney, you know, you know, wanted me to let him know if there are any legal issues came up. So he called it his attorney, Stan Drayson at the time, and Stan said no, I don't want you. You know, cal'sman cooperative with you for three days, I don't want you to question him anymore, and there will be no polygraph.

So that was the end of it. But because of that, Stan Dreysen knew that they were zeroing in on Cal, so he recommended that he consult with a criminal defense attorney, which and Dason was not, so he was the one that recommended Joe Colly.

and started UH to work on the case. Even though I wasn't privy to anything the police were doing, because he hadn't been charged with anything, so therefore there was no discovering material to give me some guidance as to what had already been done. So for the most part, I was working blind.

crime scene investigation, so I received additional training there. Later I worked in the violent felony warrant squad and so I had a lot of experience, so I knew how the police operated. I knew how they did things. I knew how they conduct major case investigations with lead desks, and so I had a pretty good working knowledge of what they were doing and why they were doing it.

But I just wasn't privy in this case as to what the results were because they were under no obligation at that stage to turn over anything that they had learned. But I knew what they were doing, I just didn't know what they were finding and what the results were. So I had to rely on what Cal could tell me, maybe a snippet or two from the newspaper her. But but but then I so I had to start pretty much from scratch, and you know, one of the first things I did was was a visit the so called

crime scene, which I did. You know, Cal was very cooperative, you know, and he spent as much time with me as I as I wanted. And then you know, he introduced me to Bart there and I talked with her, and then I went and talked to family and friends and co workers, just trying to get heads up on what the state police might be might be doing. So that that's kind of it. Is there something more that you want me to include or.

the class right after that in seventy nine. So I knew she was working on the Cal Harris case. And I found out from Stan Draisen when we met in Joe Cawley's office and he described, you know, Sue Malby coming into his office I'm going to say about two days after Shell was reported missing, and it looked him right in the eye and said, you know, I know Cal killed her and I'm going to prove it.

according to to Dresen So uh. And then as you mentioned in your in your lead end that you know, Michelle went missing in two thousand and one, but but Cal wasn't indicted until four years later in two thousand and five. But in the interim they didn't find anything new. I mean, they had those few specs of blood in the garage and in the entry way that h some of which matched the DNA profile of Michelle. Uh, But like I said, the volume of the blood was was

tiny and the age of the blood was inconclusive. But despite that, four years later, not having found Michelle or a murder weapon or anything further, they decided to go ahead and uh indict him if they did so. Once he was indicted and arrested and arraigned, a few weeks later, we started getting discovery material from logistic attorney Gerald Keene. So that was our first glimpse at what the State Police were doing, who they were interviewing, and what the

people were saying. But while we were waiting, actually while we were waiting for the discovery material to come in, you know, Cal had been released on bail, so he was free for us to meet with him and you know, prepare our defense. So during one of my meetings with Cal, he was asking me, you know, he knew my background was with the State Police, so he was asking me if I knew any of the investigators working the case, specifically Sue mob So so I started telling him, But

I knew about her. You know, she had come from a police family. Her father had once been the sheriff of neighboring Broom County, New York, back in the mid to late seventies, but he'd lost his bid for sheriff and that so that that's what prompted Cal. Uh when when he when he found out that Sue Malby's maiden name was Andrews and that she was the daughter of John Andrews, he he kind of went berserk.

Uh you know, he got right on the phone to Joe Colly and uh Joe wasn't available at the time, so we talked some more, and so I filled them in on on what I knew who about movie and her dad, and that just made him more angry that he couldn't understand why she she could be involved in this case. So eventually we uh uh you know, spoke spoke to Joe kuy about it, and uh but, like I said, we were already four years into this, he'd

already been indicted, arrested. Uh So, in any conflict that there was, uh bring bringing it to the attention of the disc attorney or or state police administration. We felt that it would just fall on deaf ears because the bell had already been rung. So so we decided not to uh, make an issue of that at the time, but but we wanted to uh closely monitor, you know, her, her involvement and go back and look at it, even right from the beginning and up to the current status

of the investigation. And uh then eventually there came a time when I was so disturbed at some of the things I was finding regarding Sue Moby that I decided to take a closer look at her in that regard.

I reached out to a couple of my trusted colleagues who had since retired from the State Police, and they reminded me of a case she had worked on about back in ninety six that resulted in her being kind of admonished by the Court of Claims in a lawsuit that filed against her for coercing the confession out of

a juvenile and she was admonished rather severely. But we didn't know any of that until until I started doing the research, and I actually got a copy of the Court of Claims, the original complaint and the decision, and I wrote that in the book the results of that, and so that was very disturbing that what she did to that young man and then for whatever reason, she was never disciplined by the state Police. In fact, it

was just the opposite. They actually promoted her and gave her a new position as a senior investigator down in the Lego. And then a short time later the cal Harris case came along.

So they they consulted with him several times. They took some of their their photographs and their physical evidence and to his lab up in Connecticut and had him look at it in hopes of him being able to say that this was a crime scene or that there this was evidence of an assault, and if he could say anything about the age of the blood with the volume of the blood, and and doctor Lee never never did a report, so we were kind of at a loss as to what he was going to say when he testified.

But when he finally did testify. Uh actually before the first trial. Uh. Uh, his testimony was kind of taken out of order because he had a scheduling conflict, so they had to videotape his testimony early and then and then present that to the court later. But during that testimony, you know, probably the most critical thing that he said was that, uh, in his opinion, based on his experience, he felt that the age of the blood was within

a couple of days. And and uh, you know, we argued very aggressively that there was really no scientific way to determine that. Uh, and there's not. But but he stuck with that with that testimony. Later on, Uh, the court ruled against him. Instead, he couldn't do that, and so any any sub squint testimony, uh, he would not be able to say with any reasonable reasonable degree of scientific certainty that it was a couple of days.

and that disc attorney of course, doctor Lee himself. And what we do, what we didn't know until much later, was that a national news magazine had come in and and videotaped that meeting, which which we thought was pretty pretty bizarre. You know, how they even knew about it is hard to imagine. Somebody had to have called them, and why they were allowed to come in during a

pre trial strategy meeting is is really unbelievable. But anyway, they did it, and they went in and they videotaped this this discussion, and of course, after Cal was convicted the first time segments of that video were presented on

forty eight hours. But when when the when the defense team reviewed that footage on the on the broadcast version, it was later determined that a lot of it had been obviously edited out, and and Cal's new attorney at that time, Bruce Barquette, who came into the picture before the third trial, he wanted to h get all of the raw footage, so he made application for it. It was originally denied, he appealed it and and eventually the

CBS had to turn it over. And uh when we looked at the footage, the most troubling part was when uh uh dis Attorney Gerald Keene and uh uh is talking with doctor Lee and he and he says that the photographs that the state police took of the blood had been altered and and and then Moby is heard trying to clarify it by saying, oh, they were just corrected, uh, which you know, either either of which would be inappropriate.

Uh and uh so that that was really really troubling and and uh and and you could hear that on a couple of occasions during that during that video segment. And then Keene is actually, i believe, asked asking doctor Lee if if the blood could have come from a cut hand, and doctor Lee said, yeah, it could come from a cut hand.

you know, Keene never told me about that. So it was it was kind of troubling for us that they were they were pursuing to get doctor Lee to to testify that the blood was much more recent than than

it appeared. And one of the other things that was pretty significant was that, you know, we had our own blood, our own photograph expert look at the photographs that they did have, and he he told us that they had actually augmented the uh, the red tone by by turning up the red color by some twenty points whatever whatever that means, so that it would appear it would appear redder than it actually was and therefore making it look

more recent than it was. So uh and then that then the troubling part too was that you know, uh, doctor Lee knew that the photographs had been altered, but yet he still uses them in his assessment. Before offering his testimony, he.

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fifteen percent off their first order. Go to third love dot com slash true Murder now to find your perfect fitting bra and get fifteen percent off your first purchase. That's third Love dot com slash True Murder for fifteen percent off today now. David, the investigation into this for on behalf of Cal Harris. You go through in this

book in incredible detail of this journey. We follow along with you to go through and first start with what you say and claim is the police would been normal procedure to follow up completely on every possible suspect, decides Cal Harris. So you went to talk to people like Brian Early, tell us about this journey, about this investigation, and how you eventually get to the point where you think you have some very very viable suspects rather than cal Harris.

anticipation of a relationship with Michelle. He had loaned her five thousand dollars to help her make a down payment on a home that he at some point in time

expected to be living in with her. So as part of the elimination process, it was my opinion that they really took shortcuts and abbreviated what they really should have been done, probably most importantly when they found out that from Brian Early that Michelle was at his house that night after work, and then it was only his word that she left his house when he said she did.

But yet they never did any forensic work of Brian Arley's apartment, his car, his person, or the hunting property that him and his cousins hunted on just over the Pennsylvania border from New York. They went out there and kind of did a look around, but they never even took any photographs, and Brian Early told them that he had her out there, so they really dropped the ball as far as I'm concerned. And by not doing that,

because Michelle had personal belongings at Brian Early's apartment. She had stayed there overnight on occasion, so that was really not the best way to try to eliminate someone. And then she also had a short intimate relationship with one of the cooks at Lefty's. His name was Michael Casper.

They'd had probably a two week flame where they had had sex two or three times at his apartment, and Michael Casper had no alibi for that night after Michelle left, and again they they didn't do any forensic work at his apartment or his vehicle or his person. So so those things, to me, we were a bit troubling that you know, if you're if you're if you're looking at these people as true suspects, then you have to eliminate them properly. And I think they spent way too much.

It gave to way too much credit to the polygraphs as a means of eliminating them.

least he was looked at as a possible suspect. It's not It's not clear why they were looking at him as a suspect because the information that was released in the discovery didn't include any of that information. But for some reason, just like Brian Earley and Michael Casper, Stacy Stewart was asked to take a polygraph. We don't know why.

You don't just randomly ask people to take a polygraph unless there's some you have a reason to believe that they're lying or they've had some type of relationship with the victim. Right, And when I'm looking through all of the leads, I'm looking for information about Stacy Stewart's polygraph

and it's not there. Uh, there was no lead taken regarding his polygraph, even though the preliminary lead indicated that he was scheduled to come in and take one, and as it turned out, they never turned that over and that that became an issue much later. Eventually we got a partial copy of his polygraph, but even then it was it was incomplete compared to the polygraphs that were taken by other suspects, in particular the conclusion page. I

thought that was pretty bizarre. But I have to admit initially I wasn't looking at Stacy's Stewart as a as a viable suspect, because that just wasn't enough information in the lead to suggest that. But it wasn't. It wasn't

until after the first trial. A new witness came forward within hours after the cal's first trial conviction, and this new witness UH revealed new information that was dynamite, which which basically changed the whole dynamics of the investigation and and UH, including a new cast of characters, including Stacy Stewart.

The new witness was Kevin Tubbs. He was a hay farmer and and he called in right after the conviction UH to Joe Cowley's office and told them he had some information that he felt was important enough to pass along. And he didn't realize the significance of his information UH until he'd read an article in the newspaper about the trial.

He had misunderstood when Michelle had actually gone missing, and as it turns out, he believed he had seen her at the foot of the driveway on the morning of September twelfth, two thousand and one, arguing with another man, not her husband. And he described this man and the vehicle he was driving. And it was in the early morning hours to just probably between five forty five and six AM, so it wasn't total daylight yet, it was just starting. But he was pulling a haywagon up the

road that goes right by the Harris Driveway. Now it's called Hagadorn Hill. At the time, it was just a dirt road, drainage ditch on both sides, and he's pulling a nine foot wide haywagon and so he was concerned about whether he'd be able to get by because this pickup truck was backed out, angled out into the road from the from the nose of the Harris driveway, and

it was partially blocking the road. So he had to swing way over to his left, hoping that he could squeeze by without going in the ditch and losing his load. So as a result, he was just creeping by. Uh and and and as he as he was going by, he looks over and he sees a woman who he thinks is Michelle Harris. Uh and he's in this other young man with dark hair, and and and Michelle appeared to have been crying or at least upset.

John Steele. He was driving up pagodor On Hill Road around the same time with a companion and and he described almost the same thing. He was a young man arguing with an older a woman who was older than he was, with blonde hair and dark colored truck. But in his case, as he was driving slowly by, you know, he had the passenger window of his truck was down, and he and he heard the young man say, just get in the car, just get in the damn car,

you know, in an argumentative type voice. But like but like with Kevin Tubbs, he didn't He didn't see the woman making any signals that she needed help, so he continued on his way, so neither one of them stopped. Unfortunately, Kevin Tubbs told me later, he says, I wish, I wish he'd said something, because I would have gotten out and beating the snot out of him, and he would have Kevin was a big guy, and maybe we wouldn't

have this conversation if he'd done that. But anyway, it was so based on Kevin Tubbs's revelation kind of changed everything from uh for the defense, and it was fortunate that he came to the defense first. So for the next four months after his disclosure. I started investigating not only Kevin Tubbs, but also what he had seen, and it took me back to UH, the lead regarding Stacy Stewart.

And I'm looking through the lead and I find out there's a They had done some background on Stacy Stewart, including a criminal history and a and a motor vehicle report and uh so he he fit the physical description described by Kevin Tubbs, and he drove a truck that matched the description. So I was, you know, that's that sent up a red flag for me. So I wanted to learn more about Stacy Stewart. So I started looking a little closer at him, and I actually got one

of my colleagues involved to help me. His name is Frank Roney. Uh. He lived in Tywer County, so he was more familiar with the area than I was. So he agreed to come on board and help me gather more information on Stacy Stewart and his UH and his associates. So he did at and it just kind of snowballed from there. Everything I learned about Stacy Stewart was pointing to him as that that he had some type of involvement with Michelle Harris Ultimately it led to Frank and

I going to Texas and speaking with witnesses. The first time we went to Texas, we couldn't find Stacy. He knew we were in town, but his cousin that we talked to, you know, wouldn't tell us where he was or how to get a hold of him. But we ended up going back about a year and a half later after we developed more information, and this time we

did find him. He was working as a corrections officer for the department of the Texas Department of Corrections and he was living right on the campus at the Ferguson Prison unit in Texas, and we found him home. Uh. He'd divorced his first wife. He was married to a second wife, and we we had about a half hour conversation with him there in his house, and we didn't like the way it went.

At least they were, but when we started questioning both of them, they started pointing a finger at each other, playing that the other the other one was having a relationship with Michelle Harrison that so that that just raised our suspense even further.

guys never went to work early. The other interesting and fascinating part and vivid part of this book is when you find out about the property that he owned, and then the cement pad tell us about this and that search. Where as a reader, we think we might be privy to something very very amazing going on with the cement pad tell us about this.

But when I started checking the records, the real property records, I discovered that he had he had purchased the property only about three weeks before Michelle disappeared, and uh, he never he never made the first payment on his property. It was a very affordable mortgage agreement that he signed with City Bank, like fourign and bucks, and he was he was making real good money there where he was

working at the steel plant. But he never made the first payment, which happened to be due on September fifteenth, so about three days after Michelle went missing. And they never made any other payments.

they worked. They worked there as welders on assembly lines, you know, manufacturing steel trustes for commercial industrial buildings. They were both very good welders, but it was line work and at the time they were working twelve hour shifts, six in the morning till six at night. And one of the things that jumped out at me with Stacy Stewart was that when he was first interviewed by the police, he told them that on the morning of September twelfth,

he'd gone into work between four and five am. Well, you know, we got his time cards and looked at him, and there were no entries on his time cards at four or five am. And everybody we talked to, including his former supervisor and other coworkers and the safety director, one of them cooberated that anyone would ever go in that early. They said it was line work. Assembly line work. You couldn't do anything until everybody was there. There be nothing to do if you went in that early, so

that became a real suspicious thing for us. But at that time, of course we did. We didn't discover this until Kevin Tubbs came forward, you know, six years into this. But at the time, back in two thousand and one, when the police first interviewed Stacy Stewart, that four to five am time frame wouldn't have been significant to them because they believed Michelle had been killed around midnight at

home by her husband. But when you look at the revelations of Kevin Tubbs and he sees Michelle with with a young man with short, dark hair around six o'clock in the morning, that kind of changes the whole theory as to when Michelle was killed or abducted, and it just happened to be around six o'clock in the morning when Stacy was supposed to be at work. So it was our belief that the reason he told the police that he had gone to work between four and five was to establish an alibi for himself.

much bigger defense team now. But I stayed on as the lead investigator and consultant because of my involvement from the beginning, and Bruce took on a very aggressive approach, and when the case finally went to trial, the third trial, it was finally held in a new venue up in Harry County, New York, which was one hundred and twenty five miles away from the Wigo, so we felt we

could get a much fairer trial there. But it turned out the trial dragged on for like almost twelve weeks, and then when the jury deliberated, they deliberated for like eleven days and couldn't reach a verdict. Even even after they were sent back in a couple of times to try, they couldn't. They were virtually split down the middle. So

it was it resulted in a mistrial. But one of the things that Bruce had asked for and was denied during the third trial was was the was the opportunity to present evidence in support of what we call third party culpability, meaning evidence that supports the belief that someone other than call Paris was responsible, and that that motion got denied. But but after the mistrial and they decided to go to a fourth trial, Bruce, you know, got together with the defense team and he said, you know,

I want to we're getting a new judge. I want to renew my third party culpability argument, but but I need something more. So, uh, we did a couple of things. One of them, we decided to uh excavate the burn pit on Stacy Stewart's property because some witnesses had told us that there'd been a burning of bloody clothes there. So we arranged to do that with an archaeological uh

UH a group from a college in Pennsylvania. They came up, they dug up the burn pit, they recovered some items and and UH all of all of the every item that was found was at least circumstantially linked to Michelle Harris. We couldn't positively say it was her because there was no DNA found. It had just been too long a time of the evidence exposed to the heat and to the elements.

from the archaeological dig who described the items that were found. H. So we felt that was an important thing for the judge to know and just other readers know. The fourth trial was actually uh cal decided to waive a jury and go with a bench trial, which is a pretty risky decision, but under the circumstances, we felt that was the right one because we really didn't think we could expect a different result with a jury other than a mistrial.

So as it turned out, that was it was a real good decision, and we had a real good judge presiding, so that made all the difference. And quick, just quickly, Uh, you had mentioned uh, the uh tearing up the concrete floor. H. Yeah.

We had actually developed information from a couple of witnesses that that when Stacy H bought his little cabin in the woods, that he had a barn there or like an outbuilding where he kept his ATVs that he rode, and all indications were he had poured the concrete in the floor of the garage after Michelle went missing, but

we couldn't confirm that. We tried. We reached out the contract concrete dealers and contractors, but you know, several years had passed and their record I think wasn't the greatest, so we were never able to confirm when the concrete was poured. But we were still interested in whether or not he might have used the concrete to help hide the body. So before we started digging, we brought in ground penetrating radar and had them scan the garage floor

and it was it was, it was. It was not a real definitive uh scan, but there was some type of mass large enough to be a human body underneath the concrete. UH. So we decided to go ahead and tear up the concrete, which which we did ourselves jackhammers

and whatever. It took front end loaders, and we examined every piece of concrete we pulled out of the air, and then once the concrete was out, we dug down six feet more and we were really optimistic at one point that we might find her, but we never did. We were disappointed, but but we kept we kept looking, and we ended up digging up an old Well what else did we do out there? We had diver searched

the pond. So we were doing as much as this on Stacy Stewart's property as the state police were doing on cows, but we were coming up empty. Also, one of the things that I should note about the items in the burn pit, when we when we asked to use those items as evidence in the trial, they were denied,

even though they were circumstantially linked to Michelle. And but you know, Bruce made the argument, and I totally agree that, you know, had had those same items been found in a burn pit on Col's property, there was no doubt that they would have been used against him.

And fascinating for you to have this as part of the book, his defiant testimony and his success in being able to change the course of this case completely.

trying to do the right thing. And they and they, they, they they attacked his credibility and then uh, and one of the other disappointing thing for me was, uh, you know when I, when I developed all of these all of this information about Stacy Stewart and Chris Thomasin actually went to the State Police and had a meeting with them, and he tried to convince them to pick up where I left off and to pursue Stacy Steward and Chris Thomason to the next level, you know, with their with

their authority and and uh uh uh yeah, and their their resources, they could have in my opinion, I think the case could have been solved. But they chose not to do that. And that still disturbs me that because I know how aggressive they can be when they pursue a suspect, and when it came to Stacy Stewart, they just didn't want to go there.

continued up at his house. And I think Stacey had a couple of friends there, Chris thomasin and Right Shoulders, and she may have thought there was safety in numbers, but they had other things in mind, and I think she married. They may very well have been sexually assaulted. And then when she tried to go home, you know, Stacy knew that would be trouble for him if if she said anything, so he follows her and stops her at the end of the driveway. He's arguing with her,

demanding that she get in the car. She's begging with him. Then along comes Kevin Tubbs, he sees what he sees, and then John Steele comes by, and then here's Stacy selling you know, get in the car, getting the damn car. And then after he's out of sight, Michelle's abducted by Stacy, and when when she realizes that her chances of survival are not good if she if he gets her back

to his cabin, she decides to save herself. But unfortunately, even though she probably fought very heroically, he overpowered her and stabbed her right there in the truck and just real quickly, we also caught up to and found Stacy's

old truck down in Louisiana and had it examined it. Unfortunately, it's now been you know, fourteen years later, but there was still traces of blood on the back seat and behind the door panels on the passenger side that tested positive for blood, but only a partial DNA profile could be established, so we couldn't conclusively say that it was

Michelle's blood. But interestingly, we also found a diamond studded earring wedged in the seat belt retractor on the passenger side that looked an awful lot like one of the ear rings Michelle would where when you look at some of her photographs and it was all it was all pitted and tarnished, but it was still intact. And there was a DNA profile on there that was inconclusive, but the one that was there could not eliminate Michelle.