Found Deceased NC - Mariah Woods, 3, Onslow County, 27 Nov 2017 #9 *Arrest*

[MsMarple]

Thanks for the explanation. I didn't know about the strangulation being a part of so many other cases. I don't tend to focus on the details of death, I'm more interested in the psychological and cultural aspects of a murderer and their social environment and how those all intersect.

That's something I enjoy about WebSleuths, that members have different interests and bring up thoughts and ideas I may not consider. And I love that we have verified professionals like nurses and attorneys who can chime in with their expertise.

You guys rock!

 

[Zelda1010]

As usual, I wasn't clear (lol). I was attributing his possible "memory lapses" to drug and/or alcohol abuse as well.

(Oh no, I think you were clear. I shouldn't be so hasty with my posts. I hate (eww) the thought of him having legitimate memory lapses of the fatal event due to drugs/alcohol that would keep him from definitively pointing the finger at the actual person responsible for Mariah's death, if such another person existed. I just hadn't thought of it really. Then I went back to edit bc I didn't want you to think I was saying eww in reference to KWs guilt or something. I just need to sit back and soak it all in again for a bit. )

 

[sloothseeker]

One recurring unanswered question in my feeble mind...when LE was called to respond to 911 call for a missing child (assumed since 911 call not released) within a short amount of time an amber alert was issued. IMO evidently at first glance by LE, there was no evidence to suggest anything other than a missing child, why else would the amber alert be issued? Apparently no evidence in the trailer to suggest a murder had taken place, no "catching of a lie being told" by family members or neighbors interviewed, apparently those dang stolen dressers didnt initially raise LE concern that this was anything other than a missing child. No accusation by KW or EK or anyone else to prompt LE to check with AW or his gf whereabouts before amber alert issued. Is it easy to have an amber alert issued? Ironically, if not for the amber alert, social media would not be telling Mariah's sad story and all her family's dirty little secrets.

 

[haven71]

(Oh no, I think you were clear. I shouldn't be so hasty with my posts. I hate (eww) the thought of him having legitimate memory lapses of the fatal event due to drugs/alcohol that would keep him from definitively pointing the finger at the actual person responsible for Mariah's death, if such another person existed. I just hadn't thought of it really. Then I went back to edit bc I didn't want you to think I was saying eww in reference to KWs guilt or something. I just need to sit back and soak it all in again for a bit. )

Oh, gotcha! Thanks for the explanation. We're good now I think!

 

[Zelda1010]

Cool. I'll leave it alone now, but yeah, I was picturing him being presented with the task of disposal and turning to drugs/alcohol and your point that the line of thinking may extend to the fatal act itself was novel and disheartening in the moment.

 

[haven71]

Cool. I'll leave it alone now, but yeah, I was picturing him being presented with the task of disposal and turning to drugs/alcohol and your point that the line of thinking may extend to the fatal act itself was novel and disheartening in the moment.

Ahhh yes...I was bouncing off your reference about possible substance abuse after to the fact, and that's when it occurred to me he could've been heavily using substances the evening of the crime which in turn could've resulted in memory lapses that could be detrimental to identifying all the players correctly and ultimately complicate the case further.

Anyway, thanks for bringing up something new to discuss and mull over, it gets slow on here at night!

 

[MsMarple]

Oh I can reach that conclusion based on the fact that she didn't immediately call the father of the missing child, you know, the one she had been in a custody dispute with.



If her hair was different she'd be ready to go clubbin'.

RBBM

When you combine KW not immediately thinking Mariah's dad may have taken her or even contacting him to see what he had to say with her calling Mariah her "angel" and saying she "loved her to death" but not showing concern for her daughter's well-being in the dark and cold night, possibly in the hands of some horrible stranger, it's not surprising that so many of us were suspicious.

Something else that bothers me is what KW said about her last memory of Mariah:

“My last memory of her was feeding her and putting her to bed,” Kristy told local station Channel 12. “I told her I loved her and she loved me.”

The reason I found it concerning was that in one case a mother told msm that the last time she saw her child she told him she loved him - except that the child had been dead for hours and her words were just a CYA. Also, IMO wouldn't there be a time lapse between feeding a child and putting them to bed? There seems to be information missing in KW's statement. JMO.

And yes, I get that not everyone responds the same in a crisis and we can't judge based on a few statements in msm but as sleuthers we've seen a lot of cases and if something doesn't ring true to us sometimes there's a reason. I won't condemn KW for her words but I darn well feel justified in being suspicious of her. MOO.

http://people.com/crime/mariah-woods-people-explains-north-carolina-girl/
http://www.wcti12.com/news/local-ne...missing-3-year-old-in-onslow-county/662840953

 

[WillenFan21]

Listening to Nancy Grace recently, she brought up the idea that the choice of disposal site may have been because there were known to be alligators in that area. It made me wonder why the water.

I'm kind of wondering if she wasn't given something that caused her to die. You would think they would have a cause of death released by now and more arrests but reports I'm pretty sure still say that they are awaiting on results. To my knowledge the only results you wait on are Toxicology results since they take weeks. This article was just as recent as yesterday and it says this in it that they are still waiting on results

No one has been charged with Woods’ death as of Tuesday afternoon and officials are still waiting on the autopsy report.

Maj. Chris Thomas with the Onslow County Sheriff’s office said it’s still too early to say when information will be released.

http://www.jdnews.com/news/20171212/officials-no-new-updates-on-mariah-woods-case

 

[Jennifer17]

One recurring unanswered question in my feeble mind...when LE was called to respond to 911 call for a missing child (assumed since 911 call not released) within a short amount of time an amber alert was issued. IMO evidently at first glance by LE, there was no evidence to suggest anything other than a missing child, why else would the amber alert be issued? Apparently no evidence in the trailer to suggest a murder had taken place, no "catching of a lie being told" by family members or neighbors interviewed, apparently those dang stolen dressers didnt initially raise LE concern that this was anything other than a missing child. No accusation by KW or EK or anyone else to prompt LE to check with AW or his gf whereabouts before amber alert issued. Is it easy to have an amber alert issued? Ironically, if not for the amber alert, social media would not be telling Mariah's sad story and all her family's dirty little secrets.

IIrc, the Amber Alert was issued three hours after they called LE when they 'discovered' that she was missing. I imagine that the responding police would have searched the home and the immediate vicinity.

 

[MsMarple]

Once again, listening to Nancy Grace on this topic, alligators aside, water can destroy DNA evidence or destroy evidence of a sexual assault. I worry that tissue damage will not be evident because of length of time in the water. Cause of death will be undetermined. Manner of death will be undetermined. Unless there's a scull fracture, or anything consistent with a beating, I just don't know. But there won't be any murder charge(s) if they can't determine how she died. And the longer we go without an autopsy report, the less likely it seems that they know. (I understand that they are still awaiting DNA/Toxicology results, so maybe I am being overly pessimistic.)

I'm right there with you! I've said before that it seems like murderers are getting wise to the problems the ME has when a body is out in the elements for a prolonged period - maybe even starting with the CA case. To be clear, I don't have evidence to back up my thought other than I see cases where a perp finally reveals the location of their victim days or weeks later when COD is hazy. And in Mariah's case it sure doesn't look like anyone gave up her dump site.

The good news IMO is that in the right hands forensic technologists can determine an awful lot and sometimes it's enough to go to trial.

IMO there will be murder charges brought in this case or at the very least charges serious enough to put anyone involved in Mariah's death away for a long time - i.e., felony charges. And there's always the possibility that someone will confess or spill the beans on another so don't give up hope just yet. I really feel justice is coming for Mariah!

 

[TeaTime]

So these neighbors heard loud booms under their own trailer Sunday evening?? Hmmm.

Maybe it was the dresser delivery.

 

[MsMarple]

The North Carolina Office of the Chief Medical Examiner says we could be waiting quite a while for COD and MOD and it would be considered within their normal range for processing everything. In Sherin Mathews' case it has been about 8 weeks now since her autopsy was performed and they have not released the findings, I believe in her case we were told to expect a wait of about 90 days give or take but obviously special testing could take longer.

I do not know if the FBI plays any role in the collection of evidence from the decedent in these cases as they are initially involved with any missing child case. I imagine that DNA evidence or fibers and so on may be sent from the medical examiner to the FBI to analyse, though this could be based on the capabilities of the Chief Medical Examiners lab equipment. Again, I do not know and am just speculating!

JMO



http://www.ocme.dhhs.nc.gov/faq/OCME-FAQ-Pamphlet.pdf

Well, we know that at least some evidence was sent to Quantico for examination and that some high tech devices were used in the investigation:

Meador said several “items of interest” have been taken to Quantico, Virginia for further detailed analysis. Those items, Meador said, were flown to Northern Virginia by a Marine Osprey. Meador would not elaborate on the origin of those items but said they had come from the “ongoing investigation.”

Earlier in the morning at the Woods residence, agents from NCIS placed seven 3-Dimension Imaging devices on the side property of the home. Shelley Lynch, public information officer for the FBI said these devices were used to capture images of the immediate surround area and to be as references if needed at a later time. The equipment was removed early Thursday afternoon.

http://www.jdnews.com/news/20171130...-transported-to-quantico-in-missing-girl-case

Nothing has been released yet about the results, if any, but hopefully the FBI found something of importance.

 

[MyBelle]

One recurring unanswered question in my feeble mind...when LE was called to respond to 911 call for a missing child (assumed since 911 call not released) within a short amount of time an amber alert was issued. IMO evidently at first glance by LE, there was no evidence to suggest anything other than a missing child, why else would the amber alert be issued? Apparently no evidence in the trailer to suggest a murder had taken place, no "catching of a lie being told" by family members or neighbors interviewed, apparently those dang stolen dressers didnt initially raise LE concern that this was anything other than a missing child. No accusation by KW or EK or anyone else to prompt LE to check with AW or his gf whereabouts before amber alert issued. Is it easy to have an amber alert issued? Ironically, if not for the amber alert, social media would not be telling Mariah's sad story and all her family's dirty little secrets.

An amber alert is issued when LE want and need the public's help in finding the missing child. The public pays attention to them.

 

[Jennifer17]

What would the point be of the FBI putting the imaging devices on the property? To guard it from intruders?

 

[Doghairrules]

In other Onslow County news, a teacher has been arrested for sexual abuse. Sigh.

http://abc11.com/north-carolina-teacher-accused-of-having-sex-with-student/2776952/

 

[DAnthrplgst]

What would the point be of the FBI putting the imaging devices on the property? To guard it from intruders?

No, the instruments used were to take laser guided scans of the property so that they can reconstruct the exact layout as a 3D model. We (archaeologists) use that kind of kind of technology when initially examining a location for digging. It helps us to put anything we find into it's proper geologic and historical context and it gives us points for survey reference when we lay out our grid.

Now, WHY they would want to make this kind of scan, I have no clue since there was no digging done on the property but, and this is pure speculation on my part, perhaps they either intended to dig at some point before discovering Mariah's body in the water OR they simply wanted a 3D layout of the property as a part of the evidence gathering. Of course, another possibility is that they simply took the scan as part of the investigative process and have no intention of using it any longer.

 

[deoneta]

JMO, but I believe the account of the neighbors hearing a thumping or banging under the trailer was most likely poor sentence construction. I think it meant under the AW/EK trailer. If the noise was beneath the neighbors' trailer, I think they would have checked it out for themselves. This may have been the source of investigators interest in searching beneath the AW/EK trailer. I agree that the noise could have been moving the dressers.

 

[mrsu]

JMO, but I believe the account of the neighbors hearing a thumping or banging under the trailer was most likely poor sentence construction. I think it meant under the AW/EK trailer. If the noise was beneath the neighbors' trailer, I think they would have checked it out for themselves. This may have been the source of investigators interest in searching beneath the AW/EK trailer. I agree that the noise could have been moving the dressers.

But really they were just nightstands, and cheap ones. I can carry our expensive nightstand by myself with no issue when I move the furniture in our bedroom so I doubt they’d be banging, but maybe?

 

[moonlessnight]

what neighbors heard loud booms?

Originally Posted by mrsu
So these neighbors heard loud booms under their own trailer Sunday evening?? Hmmm.

Maybe it was the dresser delivery.

 

[Subiechik21]

what neighbors heard loud booms?

Originally Posted by mrsu
So these neighbors heard loud booms under their own trailer Sunday evening?? Hmmm.

Tortoise found this article & posted the quote, it is new info to me but the article is from November 29.
http://www.arkansasnews.com/zz/news...ah-woods-continues-on-day-3-in-north-carolina

Two law enforcement officers then walked door to door, knocking and talking to neighbors. One neighbor, Kelly Kerr, allowed agents to examine the area beneath her rental property after she and other residents in the home heard a loud sound emanating from their home late Sunday night.

“It sounded like something hitting a piece of wood real hard,” said Kyle Bonitz, who shares the home with Kerr.