GA GA - Shirley, 87, & Russell Dermond, 88, Putnam County, 2 May 2014 - #10

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Shirley and Russell Dermond

Missing wife of decapitated Georgia man found dead in lake
By Chelsea J. Carter and AnneClaire Stapleton, CNN
updated 10:54 PM EDT, Fri May 16, 2014

Shirley Dermond's body was found in Lake Oconee, south of Athens, Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills told reporters Friday.

"We now, unfortunately, know that Shirley Dermond was murdered," Sills said. Sills declined to discuss the condition of the body other than to say, "the head was not removed or anything like that.

"We haven't even had a funeral for Russell because their kids wanted to wait. Now that we know about Shirley, we will start planning the funeral services for both.

GA GA - Shirley Dermond, 87, Putnam County **Media Links***NO DISCUSSION*** - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community

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Hoping this thread brings answers.

I've had several thoughts lately, but nothing but speculation. No MSM or anything to back it up. Just thoughts running through my head.

Any history of mental illness within the family? Something we probably won't ever know, but the one son using drugs, makes me wonder if he was self medicating a mental health issue. Pure speculation.

Could a child have been molested as a child, who is now an adult, and sought revenge for someone not believing them, or against the abuser? Pure speculation.

The more I think the personal, so close to the victims, type of murder, I do believe someone held onto a grudge or some sort. Now whether that person was done wrong, or they perceived they were done wrong....at this point...who knows! Pure speculation.

Lastly and OFF TOPIC...but the ad on this thread says "only you can prevent forest fires"...how did they know I was burning brush yesterday??? :thinking:
 
Speculating as well, but I don't think the Dermonds were murdered because of something that happened decades ago. Usually, people don't wait that long plus no one knows when death will come first. To me, the planning, anger and desire for retribution have all been within the past few years at most.
 
brought forward:
Quote Originally Posted by Bootsctr View Post
I tried looking at the pictures of the house again at Zillow.com. It's only the map and areal view. When I switch over to the tax records it says the owner is Keith B. Dermond & ET AL.

http://qpublic7.qpublic.net/ga_displ...am&KEY=120A008

Zillow.com says the house is off the market. Did the kids take it off the market or did they purchase the house?
http://qpublic7.qpublic.net/ga_displ...am&KEY=120A008

I am thinking it has not been Updated Yet, as the link states at the bottom:
" Website Updated: May 5, 2015"

Tax records show children still own the home but if sold probbly not updated yet, sometimes it takes a while

Also, Treelights, thanks and was hoping as all others that since RD is deceased now, that his enlistment and draft would be online, maybe its not updated yet, may have to be ordered as you mentioned, will wait til a later date, was curious about his enlistment details if available
 
So after a year since the Dermond murders, the abduction of Shirley, and the decapitation of Russel, what do we know? What do we not know?
________________
Dr. Edmond Locard's exchange principle holds that the perpetrator of a crime will bring something into the crime scene and leave with something from it, and that both can be used as forensic evidence. Dr. Edmond Locard was a pioneer in forensic science who became known as the Sherlock Holmes of France. He formulated the basic principle of forensic science as: "Every contact leaves a trace".

"Wherever he steps, whatever he touches, whatever he leaves, even unconsciously, will serve as a silent witness against him. Not only his fingerprints or his footprints, but his hair, the fibers from his clothes, the glass he breaks, the tool mark he leaves, the paint he scratches, the blood or semen he deposits or collects. All of these and more, bear mute witness against him. This is evidence that does not forget. It is not confused by the excitement of the moment. It is not absent because human witnesses are. It is factual evidence. Physical evidence cannot be wrong, it cannot perjure itself, it cannot be wholly absent. Only human failure to find it, study and understand it, can diminish its value."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locard's_exchange_principle
____________

* Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills thinks that he may never solve this horrific crime
* The Dermond's home in RP/GW has decreased by more than 50%, from $1,000,000.00+ to less than $479,000.00
* The GBI elite special agents have not been requested by SS
* The FBI & FBI BAU2 is assisting in the investigation - Psychological Profile of Unknown Suspect/s prepared by the BAU2
* The COD of SD & RD was blunt force trauma with different weapons
* Nothing taken by the perp/s, no forensic evidence reported from CSI
* Boat was used and possibly a vehicle/s
* $55,000 in reward money - yet the flow of tips has all but dried up <First case SS has utilized a reward in an investigation/4 decades>
* Utilization of Social Media by the Putnam County Sheriffs' Department is nonexistent
* Security cameras were not functioning at Great Waters community Guard house entrance
* Suspicious Home alarm system activity 2 weeks prior to murders
* No forced entry
* Mr D's decapitation, although not the work of a skilled surgeon, the cut was remarkably clean
* No suspicious red flags identified from the investigation of the D's phone or financial records
* Unidentified man witnessed in the D's yard on the likely date of deaths - no description available
* Cinder blocks utilized to anchor Mrs D in the lake
* Ain't local talent



Son of slain couple in grisly Putnam case: Mystery &#8216;just eats at you&#8217;
BY JOE KOVAC JR.
jkovac@macon.comAugust 6, 2014

Read more here: http://www.macon.com/2014/08/06/3236608_son-of-slain-couple-in-grisly.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy
In the days and weeks since early May when his elderly parents were killed, Keith Dermond has been as puzzled as anyone else.

Russell and Shirley Dermond had been married 62 years. Both in their late 80s, they fell prey to unspeakable violence -- savagery as the Putnam County sheriff has called it -- and whoever inflicted it seems to have left nary a trace.

&#8220;It just eats at you that somebody could do this and possibly get away with it. ... We don&#8217;t even know the motive at this point,&#8221; Keith Dermond said by phone Wednesday. &#8220;It&#8217;s very hard to catch somebody when you don&#8217;t even know their motive, and you don&#8217;t know whether they would do it again.&#8221;
&#8220;Myself and one detective continue to work on this every day,&#8221; the sheriff said.
The 3,200-square-foot, $1 million home sits in a tree-shrouded cul-de-sac in the Great Waters subdivision, a dozen or so miles northeast of Eatonton.
Autopsies showed that she and her husband died of head wounds, but exactly how they were killed is anyone&#8217;s guess.
The FBI and some Georgia sheriff&#8217;s investigators have helped in the probe, poring over the case file.

&#8220;The techniques they have of uncovering evidence and stuff like that,&#8221; Keith Dermond said, &#8220;it&#8217;s almost hard to believe that somebody could be that good a criminal that they didn&#8217;t leave behind anything.&#8221;
__________________

<snipped & BBM for Focus>

On a recent afternoon, Putnam sheriff&#8217;s Detective Dave Henry was in Sills&#8217; office.
Aside from Sills, Henry knows more about the Dermond case than anyone.
&#8220;Seems like every free minute I&#8217;ve got, my mind is rehashing stuff, trying to think of things we may have missed or overlooked,&#8221; Henry said.
&#8220;I try to keep an open mind. I try to keep the blinders off, because I don&#8217;t want to get tunnel vision on any one person or any one theory. ... Everybody&#8217;s got their own theory on what happened -- and a lot of them are possible.&#8221; Tips, meanwhile, have run the gamut. None, of course, has panned out.

&#8220;Anything that is halfway sane is a very plausible theory,&#8221; Henry said, &#8220;at this point.
&#8221;
He recalls one tipster, though, who was convinced that the killer is an al-Qaida or Islamic State operative.
Some have suggested professional hit men as the culprits. Others figure the Dermonds fell prey to a cult.

Still others wonder if the slayings were a plot by religious zealots to embarrass the sheriff for sending Nuwaubian leader Dwight York to federal prison for life in a heralded case from a decade ago.

Read more here: http://www.macon.com/2015/05/02/3726718/new-details-as-mystery-reigns.html#storylink=cpy________
____________________

A text message chimed in from a cop buddy in Atlanta who&#8217;d seen Sills on the news: &#8220;You look tired.&#8221;
Then came an email, encouragement, from his friend Bright, the district attorney: &#8220;I know you&#8217;re going to solve it. You always do.&#8221;
Sills, reclining in his chair at the end of an 18-hour day, said, &#8220;I don&#8217;t know that I am.&#8221;


- See more at: http://www.atlantamagazine.com/grea...d-sills-chases-a-killer/#sthash.euzJGepn.dpuf

Read more here: http://www.macon.com/2015/05/02/3726718/new-details-as-mystery-reigns.html#storylink=cpy

<my comment - jmho - to be edited - feel free to add to the list of knowns & unknowns.>
 
Not only his fingerprints or his footprints, but his hair, the fibers from his clothes, the glass he breaks, the tool mark he leaves, the paint he scratches, the blood or semen he deposits or collects. All of these and more, bear mute witness against him. This is evidence that does not forget.

The evidence might not "forget" but after a year much of it could certainly disappear.

The shoes that made the footprints can get thrown out, the tires that left the tracks get replaced, the clothing that left the fibers is discarded etc... Same thing with any trace evidence the killer took with him.

The killer's DNA would still be valid but a whole lot of crime scenes (especially "clean ones") do not yield any DNA evidence.
 
The evidence might not "forget" but after a year much of it could certainly disappear.

The shoes that made the footprints can get thrown out, the tires that left the tracks get replaced, the clothing that left the fibers is discarded etc... Same thing with any trace evidence the killer took with him.

The killer's DNA would still be valid but a whole lot of crime scenes (especially "clean ones") do not yield any DNA evidence.

Sonya610, not a month goes by that we do not hear of a decades old cold case that is solved by forensics that was properly collected and stored by crime scene investigators. Many if not most of these crimes occured long before the dna technology was available to investigators..

Just two examples of many:

NEW DNA TECHNOLOGY HELPS SOLVE 2 DECADES-OLD MURDER CASES

http://abc7chicago.com/news/new-dna-technology-helps-solve-2-decades-old-murder-cases/640637/
_______

Police credit DNA technology with cracking 1981 cold case
http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/ne...credit-dna-technology-cracking-1981-cold-case
 
:seeya:

marking my spot on the shiny new thread
 
Sonya610, not a month goes by that we do not hear of a decades old cold case that is solved by forensics that was properly collected and stored by crime scene investigators. Many if not most of these crimes occured long before the dna technology was available to investigators..

Just two examples of many:

NEW DNA TECHNOLOGY HELPS SOLVE 2 DECADES-OLD MURDER CASES

http://abc7chicago.com/news/new-dna-technology-helps-solve-2-decades-old-murder-cases/640637/
_______

Police credit DNA technology with cracking 1981 cold case
http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/ne...credit-dna-technology-cracking-1981-cold-case

Both of those examples involve rape/murder victims, no doubt the rape played a large part in providing DNA. There is no reason to suspect that either of the Dermonds were raped. In fact there IS reason to suspect that no DNA was recovered on the bodies.

In reality (not the movies or fictional books) DNA is rarely found. If this killer gets caught it will probably be because he told someone.

Future advances in DNA matching mean nothing if no DNA is recovered to begin with.

This article highlights a study which concluded that DNA was only found in about 4.5% of murder scenes. http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/11/07/the_case_against_evidence/?page=1

And another article states the same thing, DNA rarely plays a part in cold cases:

What made for a cold case conviction? New witnesses helped resolve 63 percent of the cleared cases, the survey found. Often an ex-girlfriend or ex-friend of a murderer came forward years after a crime. DNA matches figured in only 3 percent of the cleared cases. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140306-cold-cases-murder-csi-forensic-science/
 
Both of those examples involve rape/murder victims, no doubt the rape played a large part in providing DNA. There is no reason to suspect that either of the Dermonds were raped. In fact there IS reason to suspect that no DNA was recovered on the bodies.

In reality (not the movies or fictional books) DNA is rarely found. If this killer gets caught it will probably be because he told someone.

Future advances in DNA matching mean nothing if no DNA is recovered to begin with.

This article highlights a study which concluded that DNA was only found in about 4.5% of murder scenes. http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/11/07/the_case_against_evidence/?page=1

And another article states the same thing, DNA rarely plays a part in cold cases:

<BBM for focus>

Very interesting article, Sonya610. Thanx for sharing. Any time I see a statement; (not the movies or fictional books)or (this ain't CSI, crimes aren't solved in an hour), the article looses all credibility, imo.

Due to fairly recent dna technology advancements, dna laws, dna and fingerprint databanks; VICAP: a federal database that tracks murders and other violent crimes. FBI VICAP <Violent Criminal Apprehension Program>, FBI CODIS: the FBI's DNA database, FBI AFIS fingerprint databank <Automated Fingerprint Identification System>. Combined with proper CSI techniques and training, MSM and internet social media awareness, and additional federal/state financial and other investigative resources.
Imo, the times, as well as the investigative procedures and statistics, 'they are a changin'..

Locard's exchange principle is a concept that was developed by Dr. Edmond Locard prior to 1966. DNA testing was first utilized by investigators in 1985, almost 20 years later.
__________

https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R41800.pdf
DNA Testing in Criminal Justice: Background,
Current Law, Grants, and Issues
Nathan James - Analyst in Crime Policy
December 6, 2012

As early as the 1980s, states began enacting laws that required collecting DNA samples from offenders
convicted of certain sexual and other violent crimes. The samples were then analyzed and their
profiles entered into state databases. Meanwhile, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
Laboratory convened a working group of federal, state, and local forensic scientists to establish
guidelines for the use of forensic DNA analysis in laboratories. The group proposed guidelines
that are the basis of current national quality assurance standards, and it urged the creation of a
national DNA database. The criminal justice community began to utilize DNA analyses more
often in criminal investigations and trials, and in 1994 Congress enacted legislation to authorize
the creation of a national DNA database.
<snipped - read more>
 
We really don't know what evidence SS found, and I thank him for not sharing everything. There could be DNA found eventhough there was, most likely, no rape. Someone earlier mentioned that you can't say what isn't unless you know what is.
 
(I am way behind and have not been able to read every post here, but I commend all of you for your work in these threads...this is truly a horrific case and I hope that the person(s) responsible are found!

The only thought I have to contribute to this thread at this time is that there has got to be a financial element/motive/factor somewhere. So many cases involving the elderly that I've seen always come back to money/greed, in one way or another. Jmo)
 
The daughter's visit keeps coming back to me if nothing else does. Was it a coincidence? was it coincidence that it was Easter? Something was in the making before the D's were murdered but for how long before? I guess I wonder if she was an instrument in some way or to warn or coerce the D's into or out of something, was there a threat to harm the D's by someone? OF course no one would know because soemthing of illegal nature would not be discussed by the D's with their friends/neighbors or if extortion or blackmail and the family won't discuss anything for fear if so

Just thinking out loud, MOO and thoughts
 
The daughter's visit keeps coming back to me if nothing else does. Was it a coincidence? was it coincidence that it was Easter? Something was in the making before the D's were murdered but for how long before? I guess I wonder if she was an instrument in some way or to warn or coerce the D's into or out of something, was there a threat to harm the D's by someone? OF course no one would know because soemthing of illegal nature would not be discussed by the D's with their friends/neighbors or if extortion or blackmail and the family won't discuss anything for fear if so




I think the Easter visit was just a daughter coming home to see her parents. To me, the Dermonds would have to be kept alive for any type of blackmail or extortion to be successful. They couldn't pay if they're dead, and trying to extort money from a family member by killing the parents doesn't make much sense, but then not much else does either.
 
Even if the murder and decapitation was a message to another? Since we don't really know, just brainstorming, clearly their was something amiss somewhere, not that RD or SD are guilty of anything themselves.

Looks like his father died in 78 if I'm on the right track, broward county FL, maybe he inherited money and used his own funds plus that to fund his ventures in the 80's,

Wondering what prompted the move to GA also

Like I said, just brainstorming
 
The daughter's visit keeps coming back to me if nothing else does. Was it a coincidence? was it coincidence that it was Easter? Something was in the making before the D's were murdered but for how long before? I guess I wonder if she was an instrument in some way or to warn or coerce the D's into or out of something, was there a threat to harm the D's by someone? OF course no one would know because soemthing of illegal nature would not be discussed by the D's with their friends/neighbors or if extortion or blackmail and the family won't discuss anything for fear if so

Just thinking out loud, MOO and thoughts

I don't think so, but your post made me wonder if anyone other than family was visiting with them. Like a grandchilds girl/boyfriend, roommate from college? I'm sure SS has explored that idea though.
 
http://www.websleuths.com/forums/sh...County-2-4-May-2014-9&p=11773743#post11773743

Bringing this forward just to answer your questions;

Steleheart, Got some questions, because I would like for you to elaborate on your theory. Are you saying that the "simplicity and neatness" of the scene is to draw attention to the headless body by contrast rather than conceal the identity of the perp?
Do you think that the perp is local or someone from a more distant past?
And done at this time because the perp was unable to get to Mr.D sooner, perhaps because he was incarcerated or institutionalized?
Is the personal satisfaction enough for the killer or is he going to need some recognition of some kind? Would he have done this sort of thing before and do you think he has a bucket list of victims?

~ Yes in my scenario I think the simplicity and neatness of the dead and faceless RD is in contrast to his opulent and perfect home. Relegated to the garage like a common person., with nothing else to detract from it like blood spatter, struggle, and etc. It shows a well thought out plan at least in the mind of the killer.
~ I thought of some past person only because Sills is thinking that now as well, as "Maybe we have not looked back far enough". and is only now looking at additional past employees. ( 8 or 10 IIRC)
~ Yes incarcerated makes sense to me. Time to stew, to plan revenge, possibilities are embezzlement, theft, arson, etc.
~ I think the personal satisfaction is in the mind of the killer, knowing that RD's well-to-do family would also be affected by this crime - that this killer may have lacked that kind of family environment, success, wealth, etc.
~ I think it's a targeted crime for these victims only. If he has a bucket list of revenge he will start to get sloppy. This was not sloppy.


:cow:
 
I don't think so, but your post made me wonder if anyone other than family was visiting with them. Like a grandchilds girl/boyfriend, roommate from college? I'm sure SS has explored that idea though.

Thanks, I've been trying to find information on WHO exactly visited in addition to daughter as well and HOW LONG the Easter visit was.
 
We really don't know what evidence SS found, and I thank him for not sharing everything. There could be DNA found eventhough there was, most likely, no rape. Someone earlier mentioned that you can't say what isn't unless you know what is.

There is plenty of reason to suspect there is no DNA. First off Shirley was in the water for 10 days so that rules dna out on her remains.

Secondly DNA does reveal the gender/ethnicity of the suspect (even though that is rarely discussed because it isn't PC).

If they had DNA I think Sills would have come out with a bit more info on a possible POI that they wanted to talk to, such as a white/black/hispanic male that may have been in the area that day based on the mystery dna markers <modsnip>.
 
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