WY WY - Amy Wroe Bechtel, 24, Fremont County, 24 Jul 1997

[PrairieWind]

I think about this case occasionally.

 

[chaddylex]

Going West Podcast just released an episode about Amy's disappearance

Amy Bechtel // 311 by Going West: True Crime

megaphone.link

 

[PrairieWind]

Going West Podcast just released an episode about Amy's disappearance

Amy Bechtel // 311 by Going West: True Crime

megaphone.link

Thanks for the heads up. I'll try to listen to this in the next few days.

 

[Pennysmom1]

Uden murder mystery solved – some day we will learn about Amy Bechtel

Note: The Oxygen Cable TV network aired a new documentary on the 1980 murders of Virginia Uden and her sons. It will be aired repeatedly on into the future.

www.wyomingnews.com

<<Amy Wroe Bechtel, 24, disappeared while jogging in the Wind River Mountains above Lander on July 24, 1997. Although what happened to her is not known, it is believed she is dead.

And it is also believed she died at the hands of a serial killer, who authorities believe is already in custody for a similar Wyoming abduction and killing.

That suspect is Dale Wayne Eaton, the man on death row for the famous and heinous “Little Miss” killing. Eaton kidnapped, raped and murdered another pretty young woman in 1989.

Fremont County Detective John Zerga recounted that Eaton’s brother told him that the convicted killer was in the Lander area at the time of Amy’s disappearance.
But evidence is lacking and Eaton is not talking.

My wife Nancy and I have positive memories of both Amy and Virginia.

Amy Bechtel was a part-time photographer and a darned good one.>>

 

[Pennysmom1]

Jan 21, 2021

Amy Bechtel - Disappeared

24-year-old Amy Bechtel was last seen in Lander, Wyoming on July 24, 1997. She disappeared while jogging in the Wind River Mountains of the

disappearedblog.com

 

[Pennysmom1]

1998 articles

When Amy Bechtel Didn't Come Home

When a promising young runner went missing in Wyoming's Wind River Range, everything changed for the community of athletes she left behind.

www.outsideonline.com

Missing

A runner begins her afternoon workout and vanishes without a trace. Her husband spends his every minute and hour organizing a search effort. But he won’t take a lie-detector test. What happened to Amy Wroe Bechtel?

www.runnersworld.com

 

[Cryptic]

And it is also believed she died at the hands of a serial killer, who authorities believe is already in custody for a similar Wyoming abduction and killing.

As a side note, I dont think her husband at the time was ever fully cleared by police either.

As with the serial killer possibility, there was a strange trail of coincidences, inferences, and possibilities leading to him. There was, however, no concrete evidence against the husband.

 

[PrairieWind]

I do think it is quite possible that Dale Wayne Eaton could be responsible. But there just appears to be little to no evidence. And he isn't talking. I had hoped that with his death sentence, as execution date neared he may start talking about other victims of his. But now that that was converted to life in prison, I suspect he will take his secrets to the grave.

 

[JnRyan]

I do think it is quite possible that Dale Wayne Eaton could be responsible. But there just appears to be little to no evidence. And he isn't talking. I had hoped that with his death sentence, as execution date neared he may start talking about other victims of his. But now that that was converted to life in prison, I suspect he will take his secrets to the grave.

That's my closest guess. Of course, she could have had a stalker no one knew about or an opportunistic person who spotted her on that very lightly traveled road.

I know the spouse, boy friend, etc., is always looked at very hard. But in this case, I don't see it as a strong possibility. The biggest part is I don't see a motive.

 

[Cryptic]

I know the spouse, boy friend, etc., is always looked at very hard. But in this case, I don't see it as a strong possibility. The biggest part is I don't see a motive.

I think the possibility was there, but also agree with you that a strong motive as lacking.

Evidnetly, the possibilities the police noted included diary entries made years earlier with references to hurting women and area hospitals did not have records of the immediate phone inquires he claimed to have made.

Likewise, a truck similar to his was seen in the area, and his alibi, though strong was not air tight as the rock climbing trip was called early due to a lack of needed equipment. The victim's parents and some friends also informed police that the husband was an "alpha male" type and "hands on".

But.... as you noted, I dont think the police ever developed a firm motive.

No one had ever seen the husband violent. No one had noted any jealosy of his wife's national level athletic recognition where as he was staying at "strong minor league" level. No insurance pay outs either.

Likewise, even with the shortened rock climbing trip, it evidently would still have been a very tight- but still possilbe, schedule to make it back, find and murder his wife before she finished her run.

And... as others have mentioned, alpha male personalities and "self love first and always" attitudes are not uncommon with athletes.

 

[CastlesBurning]

Amy gets a brief mention, as being one of the cases...

New Laws Could Expand Efforts To Solve Wyoming Cold Case Crimes

 

[Richard]

Missing for over 26 years...

Amy Wroe Bechtel, age 24
Missing since 24 July 1997

LINK:

 

[imstilla.grandma]

In this day and age with webcams, cellphones and other technology, it is difficult for someone to just vanish. But that is exactly what Amy Wroe Bechtel did in 1997.

For her family and friends, the worst thing is not knowing. It’s one thing to take a life. Killers like Dale Wayne Eaton do that. It’s another thing to take a death.

A silenced eulogy, a stolen memorial service. Not even a gravesite to remember her by. Amy Wroe Bechtel, like the rest of the missing, is not altogether alive nor convincingly dead. She’s a ghost.

For Steve, Amy is an ex-wife now. Steve had her declared legally dead in 2004. He has since remarried and remains in Lander.

He and his wife Ellen run their gym in Lander. They have two kids.

Steve has moved on from the past. The last interview he granted on the subject was in 2016. At that time, he had not met with his lawyers in a decade and had not spoken to Amy’s family in 15 years.

Steve also bears the weight of the condemned in the minds of some. At the very least, he has “prime suspect” still attached to his name on a Wikipedia page.

Disappearance Of Amy Wroe Bechtel Still Haunting After 26 Years

The unsolved disappearance of Amy Wroe Bechtel in 1997 remains one of the more baffling cases in U.S. history. The massive search launched when she vanished was like no other in Wyoming then or since. Even the Russians were asked to assist.

cowboystatedaily.com

 

[cvdixon29]

Her neice, apparently, has a post up on reddit about it here: Whoops! Guess that's a no-no link... I will quote some without the link...guess that is okay?



"TL;DR My Aunt disappeared when I was 9 and we still don't know what happened. I actually have more good memories from that time than bad and I feel that it shaped my life.
When I was 9 my aunt disappeared.
Her name is/was Amy Wroe Becthel

...By this point Amy had become a professional long distance runner. She was featured on the covers of several running magizines(this is before the internet got big) and was even helping plot courses for new races.
That last part is what lead to tragedy.
It was about 4 in the morning when my parents woke me up. My mother had obviously been crying and my father was clearly concerned as well when they sat down on the edge of my bed. I can't recall which of them it was that told me that Amy had not come home last night and that no one was sure where she was.
We packed in a rush, just bare essentials and nothing else and got in the car for the drive across the state. Throughout the ride my mom alternated between crying and trying to comfort us kids who were more confused and worried about our crying mother than anything else.
When we arrived in Lander the story unfolded in front of us; she had been running the day before in the mountains nearby to plot a course for a local race she was helping to set up and she simply never arrived home. By the time night had fallen her husband had called the police and the family was informed. We arrived that following morning to a scene of chaos as friends, family, and the community turned out in assistance.
At this point no one really knew what had happened. It was thought that she still might be up on the trails somewhere because her car was still in the lot, still locked, and her pouch she ran with was still missing. Everyone thought it was possible that she had fallen and been hurt or had perhaps been attacked by a mountain lion.

....One of the wierdest things about it was how there was absolutely no sign of struggle anywhere along any of the paths she should have been on. This was an extremely fit woman who could scale an inverted face of a cliff for fun and who had a rock wall gym thing in her garage that she was on daily.
This lead to a lot of people assuming that the culprit was actually her husband. The lack of struggle plus his unwillingness to cooperate and some VERY creepy journals made him one of the prime suspects for a long time.
Unfortunately, we found absolutely nothing concrete. Now, 16 years later, we still don't know what actually happened to her. There is a guy on death row already for commiting a few other murders that they think may be responsible but he isn't willing to tell if he did it or not.

....In closing I do ask that if ANYONE knows anything they please let me know. After all these years we have come to terms with never finding the truth but we can still hope."

Have the police checked to make sure that the car wasn't planted there? Since there was no shred of evidence that she was there except for her car being there. She could have been harmed elsewhere and her car planted. They need to continue to look at her husband too. It just doesn't make sense.

 

[PrairieWind]

Have the police checked to make sure that the car wasn't planted there? Since there was no shred of evidence that she was there except for her car being there. She could have been harmed elsewhere and her car planted. They need to continue to look at her husband too. It just doesn't make sense.

She had apparently been planning to go to this area to run anyway. I don't know what evidence there would be to show it was planted there.

 

[Cryptic]

She had apparently been planning to go to this area to run anyway. I don't know what evidence there would be to show it was planted there.

Good point.

To my knowledge, she routinely used the area for long distance training runs as an Olympic hopeful.

Her running routine could have become known in the general sense to an obsessed "secret admirer" from the town (as an increasingly likely Olympian, she had gotten a certain amount of media attention), somebody who lived in the general area which saw little traffic and cars driven by lone females would stand out, and.... the husband who was also a running athlete.