Author Nancy Brophy Trial Day 3, Part One

Day three of the Nancy Crampton Brophy murder trial in Portland went underway Wednesday of last week.

First up was Maxine Borcherding via video call. 

Maxine is a chef, Sommelier, writer, educator, and founder of the Taste and Compare Academy of Wine, Spirits and Food. She worked with Daniel at the Oregon Culinary Institute at the time of his death and in turn had known Nancy for many years as well.

Maxine claimed that on June 2nd, 2018, she received a call from someone she knew who was in the area of OCI. That person said there were police and crime scene tape around the building and the person had heard someone had been shot.

Maxine knew Daniel was working that day and she tried to call him and when he didn't answer she left him voicemail. She then called Nancy and told her what she’d heard. Nancy said she hadn’t heard anything from Daniel and would try to call him. When she couldn’t reach him, Maxine said Nancy told her she would go down there to see what was going on.

Maxine that she had taught with Daniel for many years, both at the Oregon Culinary Institute and the former culinary school, Le Cordon Bleu. She also said that Daniel had taught with a dry sense of humor and sarcasm and that he could be a little rough with his students.

“Dan was an incredibly knowledgeable instructor in many, many areas. If he thought a student worthy of his time and attention, he was the best instructor and mentor that a student could ask for. But if for whatever reason, he was not happy with the students, he could be pretty harsh,” she said.

Karen Brophy, Daniel’s mother, was the second witness to testify that day. 

She said that the morning of Daniel's murder, Nancy told her what was happening at the OCI via phone call. Karen said she had asked Nancy if she was going to go down to the school to see what was happening. Nancy told Karen that she wasn’t going down because of all the police cars and other cars that would be in the area.  Nancy also told Karen that she had been in bed that morning.

Karen described Nancy's voice during the phone call as calm and that “It didn’t sound like she was panicking.” 

After the brief phone call, Karen said she spoke with her husband. And after thinking about everything a little more, she called Nancy back. She told Nancy that she thought should go down to the school to see what was really going on and Nancy agreed.

About an hour later, Karen called Nancy for a third time and asked her what was going on. Nancy said that she was "in the car talking to the police" and "It was Dan." Karen said she was devastated and didn’t remember any more of the conversation. 

Officer Cassandra Wells was the next to testify.

She was one of the first Portland Police Officers that arrived at the crime scene. She said that the call came over the radio was a “code 3,” meaning police had to respond immediately with lights and sirens to the Oregon Culinary Institute. She said that she heard dispatch say that there were suspicious circumstances with the shooting victim and that they were still working on them.

Wells said that it took about three minutes to arrive to scene. When she arrived, a paramedic told her the victim had two bullet holes in the chest and that there was a bunch of students in the breakroom with their hands on the tables.

When Wells entered the breakroom, she told the students to keep their hands on the tables and stay where they are. Wells testified that she was trying to figure out who the shooter was. She said that everyone looked terrified, and she realized that she needed to call for more officers to the scene. She said that once the rest of the officers arrived, she directed them to help secure and clear the building.

Once Daniel was pronounced dead, the police escorted the students across the street to a school administrative building making them leave their belongings behind.

Wells said that when Nancy arrived at the scene, Wells stood with her after she learned her husband was dead. She said Nancy started crying immediately so Wells gave her a hug and stayed with her until detectives relieved her.

Author Nancy Brophy Trial Day 2

Author Nancy Brophy Finally on Trial for Husband's Death.

Novelist Who is Charged With Killing Her Husband Still Involved In Criminal Activity Behind Bars

Murder She Wrote

Author Nancy Brophy Trial Day 2

 

Day two of the Nancy Crampton Brophy murder trial in Portland went underway last Tuesday by calling three former Oregon Culinary Institute students to the witness stand.

The first witness to testify was Courtney Arias. She was a pastry student at the Oregon Culinary Institute at the time of the murder. She remembered the student door being locked that morning and waiting outside for Damon to open it. Which was out of the ordinary, because Daniel Brophy usually had it open by then.

Once the door was opened and students went inside, she said everything seemed fine at first and then all hell broke loose.

“And then all of a sudden I heard ‘Help me!’” Arias recalled, crying as she testified. “At first I thought they were joking, and then I saw one of my classmates Katie run past the window, because we have a window in our classrooms, and she ran past it on the phone, and she’s on the phone 911.” 

She said she then went into the kitchen where everyone was and saw Daniel on his back. Then she left the kitchen and then waited by the lockers. She didn’t realize Daniel had been shot until she and other students heard it from a responding police officer or paramedic.

Miranda Bernhard was the second witness to testify. She was a student of Daniel's at the time. She had arrived early the day of the murder. She said that it wasn't unusual for the door to be locked because sometimes Daniel would forget to unlock it. What she did find strange was that a garage door on the side of the building was open. Typically, it was only opened for deliveries. 

When she went into the school and Daniel's body was discovered, Bernhard remembered seeing Clarinda Perez kneeling next to him and doing chest compressions. 

Bernhard volunteered to keep other students out of the kitchen. She prevented a man who was a student from entering. 

Once in the kitchen, Bernhard remembered a table being askew, like it was out of place. Usually, the two tables in the kitchen would be in a row.

Bernhard said she learned about the gunshot from overhearing it from one of the policemen's radios. When the people in the building were asked to sit around the tables in the student lounge and place their hands on the tables, Bernhard realized the seriousness of the situation.

Clarinda Perez was the third witness to take the stand. Besides being a student, Perez was a medical assistant at the time of the murder. She said that she had arrived early of the day in question because it was a final exam day. Perez thought it was unusual for the door to be locked on such an important day.

She walked to a nearby Starbucks and by the time she returned to the school, the door had been opened and students were filing in. 

Once inside, Perez said she went to fill her water bottle and noticed the water container was not in its usual spot. Daniel normally had the water container filled, along with the coffee, and ready for students. 

She walked into the Kitchen 1. The lights were on, and she heard the water running. That’s when she saw Daniel lying on the floor. 

 Perez checked Daniel and found him responsive. She then ran to the doorway and yelled for someone to call 911. 

Perez immediately began CPR. 

“His chest was really squishy,” Perez testified in between sobs “and I thought I had broken a rib because as I continued to do compressions, my hands started getting full of blood.”

She said that she had no idea he had been shot. She thought she fractured his ribs, but continued compressions because she’d been taught to not stop. She said no blood was visible before she started compressions. 

When the EMTs and paramedics arrived, she stopped compressions and sat against a stove in the kitchen with her ears covered for a long time before going outside. 

Author Nancy Brophy Finally on Trial for Husband's Death.

Novelist Who is Charged With Killing Her Husband Still Involved In Criminal Activity Behind Bars

Murder She Wrote

Author Nancy Brophy Finally on Trial for Husband's Death.

Back in 2018, in southwest Portland, Oregon, romance novelist, Nancy Crampton-Brophy was accused of killing her husband, chef Daniel Brophy. Nancy allegedly walked into Oregon Culinary Institute on June 2nd, 2018, between 7:21 a.m. and 7:28 a.m., shot her husband in the back and in the chest from close range and then went home. Daniel was found on the floor in the kitchen by students arriving for class that morning.

This last week her trial started.

Nancy Brophy Trial Day One

Judge Christopher Ramras announced that Nancy's blog post from 2011 “How to Murder Your Husband” would be excluded from evidence. 

In their opening statements, prosecution and the defense both agreed that Nancy and Daniel had financial difficulties in 2017. 

The prosecution said that at the time of Daniel's murder, the couple was struggling to pay their $1,530 mortgage while also paying more than $1,000 each month in life insurance premiums. On top of all that, Nancy was spending a large amount of money on firearms putting the couple “on a path of financial ruin”. 

The defense said the couple had come up with a plan to accommodate for the delayed commission Nancy received from her Medicare sales that year. Also, Daniel had taken out a loan out against his retirement, which was something he’d done before and paid back, and that he was allegedly prepared to do again. 

The prosecution then moved on the topic of Nancy researching ghost guns online back in late 2017.  

The prosecution alleged that that act of researching guns was one of the first steps Nancy had taken towards plotting Daniel’s murder. 

The defense claimed it was part of her research for a new novel she was planning.

Besides researching ghost guns, Nancy also had purchased a ghost gun build kit. 

The prosecution claimed that Nancy couldn't assemble the kit and she sought out and purchased one at a gun expo in Portland. After realizing the slide and barrel from the first gun wouldn’t fit on the lower frame of the gun, she ordered another slide and barrel from eBay. Investigators found the first two guns Nancy purchased, but never found the slide and barrel. 

The defense claimed that Nancy had purchased several unusual items in the past for research for her novels and that purchasing a gun wasn’t out of the ordinary for her. They also said that Nancy had been inspired to buy a gun after hearing how many of her relatives owned guns, and after reading and hearing about the multiple mass shootings that happed in 2017-2018. She also wanted Daniel to take a gun with him when he went mushroom picking.

The next topic was life insurance policies. 

The defense detailed about Nancy and Daniel both having invested in life insurance for decades and that Nancy had also worked for insurance companies. 

In 2015, Nancy worried that she might die in a surgery that she had to have and so life insurance became a big concern of hers at the time.

The prosecution that cashing in on Daniel's life insurance policies that totaled $1.4 million could have been Nancy’s plan to remedy the situation with her finances. And that Nancy asked the detective for a letter to send to a life insurance company that would exonerate her as a suspect in Daniel’s murder, so she could receive $40,000 from one of his life insurance policies. 

Finally, both the prosecution and the defense said that by all accounts that Nancy and Daniel seemed to be in a happy and healthy marriage.

The first two witnesses were then called.

Kathleen Dooley was the first witness called. She is currently an educational assistant for an elementary school. She was a student at Oregon Culinary Institute, where Daniel was an instructor at the time of the murder. She was the person who called 9-1-1 that day. She said another student had found Daniel dead on the floor and yelled for her to dial 9-1-1. As Dooley was calling 9-1-1, she was trying to find the only other instructor in the building at the time, Dorothy Sadie Damon. She found Damon in the guest restrooms and the pair went back to where Daniel was lying on the floor.

The 9-1-1 call was then played in court. In the call you can hear Dooley say that another fellow student was preforming CPR.

Dorothy Sadie Damon was the next witness to take the stand. She was the pastry instructor and shared the same building as Daniel who was the culinary instructor. Damon stated that she was in the restroom washing her hands when she heard loud voices in the hall. She rushed out into the hall and saw Doolie on the phone motioning for her to follow. She then followed Doolie down the hall and into the kitchen where his body was lying. According to Damon, students were gathered around Daniel. One student was performing CPR. She said none of them could figure out what was wrong and they didn’t realize Daniel had been shot. Eventually, she said “it was obvious that Dan was gone.” Soon after realizing this, emergency medical personnel arrived at the school.

Novelist Who is Charged With Killing Her Husband Still Involved In Criminal Activity Behind Bars

Murder She Wrote

 

Lil Nitro Challege and Fundraiser!

Friday night fundraiser supporting a friend in need - YouTube

Our Friend, Small Town Jewel has to go into hospital on the 1st of April 2022 due to serious heart issues. She will be required to remain there for at-least one week, but possibly up to one month. Her little dog and cat are her life and provide essential emotional support. None of us live anywhere near her State and simple cannot afford to take that amount of time off and relocate. We are therefore trying to raise money for a pet care minder who will provide the necessary medical and emotional support for her fur babies whilst she is in the hospital. Any amount will help and go a long way to help this wonderful women .

Is one of the last photos taken of JonBenet show her with an alleged sex trafficker?

When the A&E documentary, Hunting JonBenét’s Killer: The Untold Story, premiered in April, 2019, this photo of Jonbenet was first seen. There are some that say that the lady in the photo with her is Ghislaine Maxwell, the lady on trial for being involved in an alleged sex trafficking ring with Jeffery Epstein.

Missing 3 year old Major Harris' body was found today, but media is more concerned with Brian Laundrie's body being found. Updated 10/11/2024

10/11/2024 Update: Major Harris' body was found in a container near some garbage bins in an alley at North 35th Street and West Rohr a week after his mother's murder.

Three-year-old Major Harris hadn't been seen since October 9th, 2021. On October 21st. No amber alert was issued until Saturday, October 16th, two days after Harris' mother, was found dead in a back yard near North 37th Street and West Clarke Street in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Authorities thought that Major could have been with Jaheem Clark, a man whom cops identified as a suspect in the mom's death. Around 4 p.m. on October 17th, police appeared at a home on the 5400 block of N. 31st Street where they had hoped to find him. About 15 minutes after their arrival, officers said they heard at least two gunshots that they believed came from inside the house. After the officers entered the house 45 minutes later, they found Clark with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was later pronounced dead. There was no Major found at the scene. Also missing was Major's mom's black 2008 Chevrolet Equinox, that Clark had been driving.

On Monday, October 18th, Clark's SUV was found in a parking lot on North Sherman Boulevard at West Villard Street in Milwaukee. Within the SUV was evidence suggesting Major had been in the vehicle. Allegedly, some of that evidence was traces of blood. Authorities began canvassing the area.

October 21st, Major's body was found near N. 35th Street and W. Rohr Ave. in Milwaukee based on information authorities received from two men currently in custody in connection with the homicide of Harris' mother.

The family of 3-year-old Major Harris and his mother, 25-year-old Mallery Muenzenberger released a statement after the shocking news.

"On behalf of the family of Mallery Muenzenberger and Major Harris, we want to extend our many thanks to the Milwaukee community volunteers and the Milwaukee Police Department for all of your diligence in searching for Major. It has truly been a helpless feeling for all of us that have not been able to assist in the search for Major due to having to prepare for Mallery's funeral. We are heartbroken as we prepare to say our final goodbyes to Mallery who was taken from us in such a violent fashion.

"Mallery was a beautiful kind soul who loved her little boy with all of her heart. She raised him as a single mother, working 2 jobs at times trying to provide for him. Her early aspirations were to become a nurse, and she would have made a very caring one! Mallery became involved in a life she never shared with our family. She was much too private. She was an honest person with too much trust we have found out. As we have been searching through her belongings we came across her high school senior project. How ironic that the topic she chose to present was Domestic Violence Awareness. Mallery faced her death in the hands of domestic violence in October, Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

"Mallery was raised in a family unit based on their strong faith. She attended Bible studies, Bible camps, weekly church services and daily prayer. Her son was her life — her joy — her purpose — her future. She loved her family. As we look through the pictures of her growing up, we continually see her contagious, sweet smile. You couldn’t help but be drawn to her lovable personality. She had a quiet innocence about her. She never had to be the center of attention, more than likely she was the one smirking in the corner of the room with that devious look of hers.

"Mallery’s life will not be forgotten. We will never let her memory go. We will continue to search for her beautiful baby boy, Major, and bring him home to La Crosse, to the family that loves and cares for him. Major has been a part of Mallery’s family since his birth and his missing has left an incredible void in our lives.

"We will always approach the month of October with a new appreciation and awareness on her behalf. We ask that all of us keep the victims of domestic violence in your hearts, and say a prayer that their souls rest in peace. As we transition our focus of putting Mallery to rest, we will never rest until we locate Major. We are desperate for any information regarding his whereabouts. If you have any information please contact the Milwaukee Police Department, and bring Major home. #majorstrong"

After 37 Years Tina Faelz's Murderer Was Caught, Next Year He Comes Up For Parole.

 

" I had a dream. 

It was a beautiful dream.

It was a fantasy come true.

Tina came home.

We were all home again.

They laughed and cried, 

and soon the teasing I missed began, 

but soon Tina had to leave.

Some day we'll all be together again.

I miss the family I had,

and I wish at that time I knew how lucky I was,

but the dream ended long ago,

and her last words were,

'Bye, mom." 

By Shirley Ann Griffiths Orosco

Tina Marie Faelz was born on April 27th, 1969 in Washington to Shirley Ann Griffiths Orosco and Ron Penix. She had a younger brother named Drew. The family lived in the Valley Trails neighborhood in Pleasanton, California.

Tina was described as a kind, freckled face, smiling, tomboy who was shy until you got to know her. She loved soccer and sleepovers. Sometimes she would pretend to take pictures with a filmless camera.

On April 4th, 1984, Tina attended Wells Junior High in Dublin, California with her best friend named Katie. Unfortunately, Tina was bullied mercilessly at school by a pack of mean girls. Because of the torment that she would endure daily, a then 14 year old Tina decided not to take the school bus that day and instead took a short cut home through a culvert. A short cut that would turn into a deadly mistake.

If you were to scream for help, no one would hear you. The culvert was like a swamp. The pipe was dark and with the roar of the trucks overhead on the four lane highway, it was isolating. This was a shortcut that only the brave kids would take. With the torture that Tina went through on a daily basis, she had no choice to be brave.

A truck driver driving on the highway, above the culvert, looked over to his right and saw something he thought suspicious.  It seemed to be maybe someone that had been harmed. He pulled over and started walking down the culvert. He then noticed a large amount of blood and discovered a dead body down in the creek. The truck driver, horrified, quickly left to find a payphone. While the truck driver was phoning in his gruesome discovery, two kids stumbled across Tina's body.

Police Chief Bill Eastman was the man that responded to the scene that day. This was the first time in his career he had seen something so tragic happen to such a young individual. Tina's body was still warm, which let police to believe that this terrible crime had happened only a short time ago. Tina had been stabbed 44 times. Later, the coroner would determine that for the first 38 times she had still been alive. Some of the stab wounds were up to 5 inches deep. It was surmised that there was no slip guard on the knife due to the lack of marks or indentations. And so detectives concluded that there was a good chance that the killer had cut himself in the process of killing Tina.

A grid search was set up at the scene, but there were no fingerprints, footprints and no murder weapon found. Officers did find something up in a tree, dangling above Tina's dead body, it was what turned out to be Tina's purse with her report card in it. 

The next day the family was interviewed. Tina's mother's boyfriend, Keith Fitzwater, had recently moved out. He had been creating some family tension in the home. He had a bad temper, had been violent towards Tina's mother and was a heavy drinker. According to Tina's brother, Drew, a few days before Tina's murder, Tina had yelled at Keith to leave their mom alone. 

Allegedly the only day that Keith had been nice was on the night of Tina's murder. He had asked his boss to give him a ride to console Tina's mom. Detectives interviewed Keith. He claimed that he had been at work at the time of Tina's murder. Detectives then talked with Keith's boss who claimed that Keith had been wearing a belt with a knife on the day of the murder. The boss also said that when he gave Keith a ride to Tina's house that Keith asked him to hold onto the knife. The knife was sent to the lab and it came out clean.

Officers also went to Tina's school to interview students and staff to help find answers. They found out that the previous morning, the girls that were mean to Tina had thrown rocks at her. They also had allegedly stated "Let's tie Tina to a tree and stab her." On further investigation, it was found out that the girls had been in detention when Tina was murdered, so they had an alibi.

A fellow student of Tina's came forward. Steve Carlson claimed that he and another classmate, Todd Smith, had been riding around after school and had seen Tina heading to the culvert. Steve also said that he saw another student, Jeff Michaelson, following Tina. 

Jeff Michaelson was known to carry a hunting knife, grab and grope girls and was also a bully that would pick on smaller kids. One of those kids was Steve Carlson. On the day of Tina's murder, Jeff was seen tossing Steve in a dumpster and locking him in. Steve spend around ten minutes in the dumpster until a teacher came along and let him out.

Officers went to question Jeff and notice he had a cut on his finger. He gave two different versions to police of how he acquired the cut. On was that he slipped at work while carrying a pan and cut himself. Later, he said that he got cut when cleaning a vent hood. He also never reported the cut to his boss. A search warrant for Jeff's house was then obtained. Two hunting knives were found and sent to the lab for analysis. There was no traces of blood or anything found on the knives, they came out clean.

April 26th, 21 days after Tina's murder and the day before her birthday, Walter Nyman, was on a bridge and sexually assaulted a 17-year-old girl walking home from school. The girl got away and Walter was arrested. 

Investigators found out that at the time of Tina's murder Walter lived in her town. Investigators talked with Walter's grandmother, who also lived in Tina's town. The grandmother claimed that Walter came knocking on her door on the day of Tina's murder looking all flustered and out of sorts. He told her that he wanted to get out of town.

Police searched Walter's home and found two bloody knives and bloody clothes. When the they were tested, the blood on the knives and well as the blood on the clothes came back as positive for animal blood.

Three potential suspects and none of them found with any concrete evidence tying them to the crime.

After Tina's murder, her brother, Drew, didn't feel safe. Every time he heard a noise it freaked him out and he'd call police. He even had kids joking with him that they were the ones that killed his sister. 

There was no on to fill the void that Tina had left in her brother and mother's lives. Tina's mother slowly fell into a deep despair and battled with her sanity.

Michael Ihde use to live in Tina's town. Three years after Tina's murder, Tina's mom came across an article about Michael, who was serving a prison sentence at a Washington State prison. In the article, Michael had been accused of killing a young girl around the same time of Tina's murder. Tina's mom thought the looked familiar, so she went through some of her photos. She found of photo of herself and who she thought was Michael at a barbeque.

Detectives traveled up to Washington State to interview the people that had introduced Tina's mom to Michael at that barbeque. They said that that was not Michael.

Tina's case grew cold and her mother spend much time in and out of mental hospitals. 

February, 2008, a new pair of eyes peered into Tina's case. Dana Savage went over the 20,000 pages of statements and notes. She went through all the horrific crime scene photos. 

Dana had the idea of looking into the three different serial killers that were active in the area.

December, 1983, 14-year-old Kellie Jean Poppleton was found murdered with Robert Rhoades being the killer.

In November of 1984, 18 year old, high school student, Lisa Monzo was found murdered and Michael Idhe was found responsible. 

In 1989, James Daveggio and his girlfriend, Michelle Michaud, kidnapped Vanessa Lei Sampson and sexually assaulted and tortured her in their van rigged with hooks before strangling her and dumping her body in a snowbank. 

Vanessa wasn't James and Michelle's only victim and Tina fit the profile of most of their victims. James had also attended Tina's school many years earlier. Around the time of Tina's murder, James around disappear for days on end and he knew about the shortcut that Tina had taken through the culvert.

James, who was spending life behind bars, was interviewed. He denied having any involvement in Tina's murder and instead pointed the finger at his friend, Walter Nyman.

With no concrete evidence of who ended Tina's life in such a horrible fashion, Dana look through the crime scene photos again in attempts to see if she had missed anything. That is when she got the idea to have Tina's purse tested. Tina's clothes had been tested quite a few times over the years for everything you can imagine, but her purse only had been tested once, and that was for fingerprints only.

Tina's purse was tested for DNA and on March 14h, 2011, Tina's killer was identified from drops of blood found on her purse. Steve Carlson had killed Tina.

Investigators began piecing what happened on the day.

On the day of Tina's murder, Steve's parents had left him alone at their house. Steve had called in sick to school that day. Later that day, he went to school to invite other students to his house to party, but no one seemed interested. Shortly after noon, Jeff Michaelson and some other kids locked Steve in the dumpster. After the teacher discovered Steve and let him out of the dumpster, Steve seemed intoxicated and belligerent. The teacher advised Steve to go to the office, but he walked away from the campus in the direction of the culvert.

Steve allegedly then went home and took his mom's car for a ride around the neighborhood. Steve didn't have his friend, Todd Smith, in the car like he claimed. And Todd later had told investigators that he never said he had been in the car with him. However, Steve did see Tina heading to the culvert and claimed that she gave him a dirty look. He got upset and followed her down to the culvert and killed her.

Steve, who was just released from jail for drug charges and had been previously incarcerated for sexually assaulting a young girl, was arrested for Tina's murder. 

In 2014, just before Steve's trial began, at only 66 years old, Tina's mother died of a massive heart attack.

When Steve's trial came to a close, he was convicted of 1st degree murder, but then the sentence was reduced to 2nd degree. He was sentenced 15 years to life.

At first, Steve proclaimed his innocence, but 6 years after his conviction he confessed to murdering Tina. He said he was in a drunken rage filled stupor and didn't remember stabbing her. He just remembered standing over her body with the bloody knife in hand.

Steve's next parole hearing will be in 2023. Do you think he should be set free? Do you think that he was being truthful when he said he couldn't remember stabbing Tina 44 times?

Let's Get Crafty With Creepy Crawly Crafts!

@deathbyboobie

##comecraftandchatwithsallyann ##dontbeshycomesayhi ##craftycrafters ##letsgetcrafty ##creepycrawlycrafts ##crafts ##sunday ##sundayfunday@sallyanns_crafts

♬ Unbreakable (with Sam Gray) - Telykast & Sam Gray

Mystery Deepens as California Hiker Is Gone Without A Trace. Update: Remains Possibly Found.

Update: Tuesday, August 3rd, 2021, police found a body matching Philip's description 250 yards from the trail in the park where he was last seen and beneath a tree. A coroner is slated to examine the body to make a formal identification.

37-year-old Philip Kreycik went missing on Saturday, July 10th, 2021 when he went for a brief jog alone at Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park. Philip is an MIT grad and father of two. He is no stranger to hiking, but had never been in that particular area before. It is unknown if he had water with him on a day that reached temperatures of 106 degrees farenheight. There has been many searches for Philip, but no sign of him has been uncovered.


Family members that were in the park on Tuesday night reported hearing cries for help around 1 a.m. Different agencies were brought in and did a search that is unprecedented in scope, with some of the agencies involved are using K-9’s, fixed-wing aircraft, and drones as they comb through 50 square miles of brush and tough terrain. The the massive search operation wrapped up on Wednesday night after another pass of drones and aircraft using thermal imagery turned up nothing.


Authorities are baffled as to why they have not found him yet. The family believes he is alive and might have made it out of the park. They are asking anyone living in the area to search their property for Phillip.

 Find Philip Kreycik | Facebook

Texas Killing Fields Victims Part One: Victims 1-7

The Texas Killing Fields have been described as "a perfect place for killing somebody and getting away with it." A place where "if you yelled, no one would necessarily hear you. And if you ran, there wouldn't necessarily be anywhere to go."

It is an area bordering the Calder Oil Field, which is a 25-acre patch of land situated a mile from Interstate Highway 45. It is a place where, since the early 1970s, 30 bodies of murder victims have been found. Most of the victims were aged 12–25 years. Also, many young girls have disappeared from this area and their bodies are still missing.

It is believed that many of the murders are the work of multiple serial killers.  Some shared similar physical features. Despite efforts by the League City, Texas police, along with the assistance of the FBI, very few of these murders have been solved.

1

Collette Anise Wilson was born in Texas on November 4th, 1957 to Claire Wilson and dentist and Thomas Owen Wilson. Besides being a dentist, Thomas had been a Lieutenant (junior grade) in the Navy. Together, Claire and Thomas had 10 children.

On June 17th, 1971, Collette was a 13 year old, 5-foot-2, 100 pound girl with long black hair, blue eyes and 9 siblings. It was the summer following 7th grade and she had played the clarinet at a band camp at Dulles High School in Sugar Land. At 12:30 p.m. her band director, Charlie Mays, dropped her off at Highway 6 and County Road 99.  Her mother arrived at 12:36 p.m., with Collette's younger sister Alice in tow. She saw a car parked alongside the road with a man inside, but no sign of Collette.

Collette had learned to go to a friend’s house if she were concerned or impatient.  So, her mom drove down the road to the designated friend’s house, but they had not seen Colette. The mom was starting to get worried and drove back to the intersection where she was supposed to pick Colette up.

So they called all her friends that lived nearby, but no one had seen her. There was no sign of Collette and the family knew something  must be terribly wrong. However, the authorities initially labeled her a runaway. Collette's family decided to take matters into their own hands. They organized volunteers who searched the area for the next three weeks. The family also knelt around Colette's bed and prayed every day.

2

Brenda Kaye Jones was a student at Holy Rosary Catholic School. She was born on November 18th, 1956 in Galveston, Texas to Arthur Tyler Jones and Evelyn Regina Sanders Jones. Evelyn was employed as Custodian at Galveston Independent School District. The family was a loving and close-knit one that lived at 31-F Cedar Terrace.

On July 1st, 1971, Brenda was 14 years old when she disappeared while on her way to visit her sick aunt, Jennie Sealy, at Galveston General Hospital. Her family was poor and didn't have a car so she had to take the bus there and back home. Brenda made it to her destination and then was dropped off back at her usual spot, which was just a couple of blocks from her house. Several people on the bus, including the bus driver, attested to that fact. That was the last time Brenda would be seen alive.

The next day, a painting crew was working far above the Galveston Harbor. It was 10:30am when a few men noticed something was floating in the water just off the Pelican Island bridge.

Brenda's nude body was found floating in Galveston Bay, a slip crammed into her mouth. Her wrists and ankles were bound together with the laces from her sandals.

The coroner surmised that Brenda had been kept alive all night and then strangled by her own laces. (She could have been shot instead. I read a few places that claimed her cause of death was a head wound.) It was also theorized that she had been dumped from a pier or boat due to the lack of damage to her body.

Brenda was laid to rest at the Galveston Memorial Cemetery.

3

Rhonda Renee Johnson was born on December 16th, 1956
Houston, Harris County, Texas to Charles E. Johnson Sr and Betty Huey. Betty abandoned the family when Rhonda was only 11 years old. Rhonda became the glue that held the family together. Music and the ocean was her escape. She loved Janis Joplin. She also would hitchhike to Galveston to surf.

4

Sharon Lynn Shaw was born on Aug 11th, 1957 in Mobile, Alabama. She had street smarts and was a natural leader. She was crazy about surfing. Her aunt compared her to a fish and said that she could have been a professional surfer.

Both girls were described as tomboys and totally fearless. They also were close as sisters.

On Wednesday, August 4th, 1971, 13 year-old Sharon and 14 year-old Rhonda, were last seen, when they left Webster, Texas, to make a day-trip to Galveston Bay beach, about 25 miles away. They had went there with their friend, Glenda Willis, to go to the Wix water ski school, but the wind had made the bayou too rough for skiing. Glenda later saw the girls at the beach, but they weren't ready to go home. So while Glenda was packing up her car she watched as the other two girls headed back to Wix and the island party scene on the shores of Offatts Bayou. That was the last time she saw them.

Now the girls at first were considered runaways because they had talked before about wanting to hitch hike to California where the "good waves" were.

5

Gloria Ann Gonzales was born on October 2nd, 1952 in Houston, Harris County, Texas. She was a bookkeeper at the Houston Kroger grocery store.

October 28th, 1971 was the first day of her vacation. She was last seen walking near her apartment on Jacquelyn Street in Houston. Her roommate reported her missing when she failed to come home. 

6

Debbie Catherine Ackerman had one brown eye and one green eye. She was the type of person that was real bubbly, outgoing, laughed. She loved to surf and was a champion water skier and island native who trained at Wix Ski School on Offatts Bayou.

Debbie was born on June 23rd, 1956 in Galveston, Texas to Joseph Frank Ackerman and Deomeria Marqarete Guisti. Joseph worked as a semiskilled machine shop. He was also was enlisted in the United States Army during World War II.

7

Maria Johnson was born in 1956. She was really sweet and quiet. However, once you got her going she was hard to get quiet, too. She was a pretty teen who moved to Galveston after her parents divorced and quickly became Debbie’s best friend. Maria also had a boyfriend. His name was Bob Forester and he was two years her senior and a local ski jumper. Maria was an avid water skier herself.

On Monday, November 15th of 1971, Debbie and Maria were both 15 and students at Ball High School. Debbie's parents had agreed that she could stay at Maria's house for the three day weekend. The two girls hung out at the mall and then went to a Baskin-Robbins store and bought ice cream. Baskin- Robbins was a they frequented often, usually several times a day everyday. A classmate, who was also working at the Baskin-Robbins talked with Debbie and Maria. They stated that they were going to hitchhike to Huston. The classmate then watched as the two girls walked outside and attempted to hitch a ride from the vehicles that passed by. Soon a man in a white van with a peace sticker on the back window pulled up. It seemed to the classmate that the girls knew the man in the van. The classmate looked on as the van's back door opened and Debbie and Maria climbed in then drove away. That was the last time the pair would be seen alive.

On November 17th, 1971, Debbie and Maria's bodies were found nude from the waste down in Turner's Bayou. Both girl's hands had been bound with shoe laces and they both had been shot in the head with a .38-caliber pistol at close range.

"There is a mother who misses you
sadly,

And finds the time long since you went,

And I think of you daily and hourly,

But I try to be brave and content.

But the tears I shed in silence,

And I breathe a sigh of regret,

For you were mine, And I remember,

Though all the world forget.

Sadly Missed By: Mother, Father, Wayne and Glenn."

On November 23, 1971, a man looking for buried treasure stumbled upon Gloria Gonzales' severed remains near Addicks Reservoir. Investigators surmised that animals had detached her head from her body. One of the things they found weird was that her body still had some flesh on it and the head did not. There was a four inch piece of wood cinched around her neck with a two foot cotton cord. The cause of death was thought to be that of ligature strangulation. (However, i read a few different places that it was blunt force trauma to the head.)

There had also been a human molar found there that did not belong to Gloria. Investigators returned to the scene to search further and found Collette Wilson's nude body with a gunshot wound to the skull near the Addicks Reservoir. The body was only 35 yards from where they had found the tooth a few days earlier. Her dad identified the tooth as Collette's because he had performed her dental work himself. There was no sign of her clarinet.

Collette Wilson's  father, Thomas, lived only four years after her death. He had become obsessed with solving the case. He died of a heart attack at age 42. 

Collette's youngest brother also died 4 years after her death. He was accidentally run over and killed in their driveway by a friend who didn't know he was behind the car. When he tried to back out of the driveway, he crushed the child.

On January 3rd, 1972, two boys fishing in Clear Lake discovered what they thought was a sports ball floating in the water. On closer inspection it turned out to be a human skull with a crucifix wrapped around the jaw bone. Six weeks later, searchers discovered the rest of the body, along with that of another, in a marsh near the lake.  

On February 17th, 1972, dental records, along with Sharon Shaw's mother positively identifying the crucifix as her daughter's, confirmed that the skull and body belonged to Sharon. The other body found in the marsh was positively identified as Rhonda Johnson. There was no evidence of trauma found on either of the girl's bodies. The cause of death of both girl's were undetermined but they were classified as a homicide. (I also read where they had been bound at the feet and hands and shot in the back of the head.)