Morgan would sit an wait for hours, to capture the image. Investigators owed her the same respect.
In some cases a simple lacking of knowledge would be better than none at all. But just what do I mean by that? I’m focusing on only one thing – the training of the Garfield Sheriffs to carry out a specific task. A task I wasn’t aware they took on in its entirety. It is very specialized and training intensive. Months ago, a typical scenario for another law enforcement agency was explained to Steve and I, so we could identify similarities and alas, there were none.
I am talking about the proper processing of a death scene. The single most important element to an eventual arrest and conviction of the criminal. There is undoubtedly no one best way to do it, but then there would certainly be a minimum, a bare minimum. I researched once into the Deputy Coroner of the Garfield County, Where our daughter Morgan was killed, and then her death scene investigation was conducted.
Before it was so upsetting to discover the fact that just a little to the west, in the next county over, in Mesa County, there is a different coroner naturally. But this coroner is himself a medical doctor and requires every deputy coroner to complete two different certifications (not so in the county where Morgan was murdered):
1. Investigator to be a member in the Colorado Coroner’s Association (CCA). The CCA sets standards for minimum training to become a member and requires continuing education to maintain membership.
2. The American Board of Medicolegal Death Investigators (ABMDI) ® is a voluntary national, not-for-profit, independent professional certification board that has been established to promote the highest standards of practice for medicolegal death investigators.
This is the minimum in the adjoining Colorado county. The Garfield County Coroner is not a doctor, which is not required, he was an owner of the funeral home and legally only needed a High School diploma, and the Deputy Coroner at Morgan’s death scene was the funeral home manager at Farnum-Holt Funeral Home and had none of the training required by Mesa County – none. The Deputy Coroner does not need to meet any requirements, not even a High School diploma, but he is responsible for certain filings, etc., which …this is who showed up at Morgan’s crime scene to determine if there was any foul play. Thomas Walton, the then Garfield County Deputy Coroner – after all our due diligence, collecting all the state documents, we now know he had no training, and did none of the paperwork required for this position, making him legally not a deputy coroner. He was the one who took the crime scene photos we have, never took a body temp, and said he got all his “facts” from the sheriffs, he never interviewed us. He later said he could not make any changes on Morgan’s PER unless instructed by Detective Glassmire, because that is where he got all his information. The law clearly shows this is not what should be done.
But I was not there when he wrote up his “Autopsy Request” in which his “facts” were all wrong, and now as read the unattended death report for Morgan, I find that Thomas Walton – Chief Deputy Coroner of Garfield County – didn’t really do anything, the sheriffs by their recounting, were the ones involved. But they have no certification in death scenes either! Is this a search for the truth? Is this how you would want a suspicious death investigated? Colorado law clearly states this is not how you do it – but that didn’t stop them in Morgan’s case.
In fact, in the neighboring county, that I refer to, they actually have standards, and the law enforcement officers are not to touch the body, maybe because they are not trained! There were observations made the Garfield County Sheriffs investigators that are completely wrong and contradict each other, maybe, once again, because they have no training in death scene investigating. And before the crime scene photos were even taken (maybe before the deputy corner even arrived) someone had illegally tried to close Morgan’s eye, wiped blood off her face, covered her up with a towel, and many other things that they are NEVER supposed to do in a suspicious death investigation. Incompetence, inadequate investigation, “bumbling” like the DA said, or something more sinister?
So as I look at this more globally, it is a sad state of affairs. For any death in Garfield County at that time, it was likely going to be presided over by a funeral home manager from Farnum-Holt Funeral Home, with no real training in death scene investigation. He does not even belong there! And then doing the actual hands on investigating will be sheriff’s officers with no certification in death scene investigation. Did the honorable District Attorney even know this when she said that the Garfield County Sheriff’s Department completely botched the investigation?
In Mesa County, Colorado, deputy coroners have two forms of certification in death scene investigation, ongoing education, and law enforcement – look but don’t touch, you are not trained. In Garfield County, none of the above. Does apprehending and convicting the criminals mean anything here? Is it just an after thought? Not really a serious consideration? Or is it just women they do this to?
Morgan’s death scene investigation was no investigation at all as far as I can see. The observations made are contradicted by the contracted forensic pathologist whom none of the experts that have looked over Morgan’s case agree with so I’m left to conclude they are most likely both incorrect. Is this how my daughter’s investigation should have been conducted? Untrained, no trained, little training, and please don’t give me an excuse about on-the-job-training. Experience by doing it with no training a few times, learn from your mistakes. It is unbelievable to me! Morgan deserved far more than that.
We can’t bring Morgan back, and we can’t have a do over on her investigation. What I really want to know is what do we tell he next family and their girl. I truly and very deeply worry for them now.
Is there a chance Morgan got redressed and went back out after dad talked to her and told her goodnight? I’m wondering about any texts or calls made/received after she left her friends house to come home that night before.
It was checked – no texts, no calls, no emails, and two nights before she was murdered she did dress herself and she came in my room with puppy on leash, car keys in hand and asked my to walk her to the car with pepper spray and make sure she made it out of the neighborhood safely (as she was scared). She said for the last 15 minutes he had been tapping on her window and she was exhausted and wanted to go to her friends grandma’s house to get some sleep – she felt safe there. So I walked her out and she left and texted me when she was safe and locked up in there house. She came home the next morning and yes when I back tracked the time on the cameras apprx. 15 minutes before she left someone was right up against the tree that touched the back of our house that we know he climbed to get on the roof and tap on her window – we didn’t know it back then. If she ever left at night (which she did do she would always wake me and have me walk her outside – remember she had a stalker). Sometimes she would even get a call from a friend that needed someone that was sober to pick them up and drive them home and she would wake me up and ask if she could take the car – I always said yes after I made sure there was enough gas in it. So no she would not have gone out without waking us, but she could have dressed herself to come get me when she was overcome by an intruder. The only text she did after she got home was to her new boyfriend to tell him she would meet up with him in the morning.
Would Morgan have yelled for you if so could you have heard her from ur room? It’s baffling why the puppy didn’t make noise. And then again I feel certain there was a struggle in her room that night for her newly French manicured nails to be chip/broken. This is one mystery I can not shake. One more question, if you knew the stalker had played with the locked keypad before did you have a camera pointed on the front door that night? I know nothing was seen at the window but the doe walking by. Also, the clothes she died in were they the same ones she came home in? And were her hands tested for any residue from the drugs found in her system? Why do u think the stalker never really tried to scare her in other ways as well (threatening notes, leaving dead animals for her to find, calling her from remote pay phones etc). Why did he just stick to tapping and rocks basically? I can’t help but from to wonder why ur husband, family, friends, male friends, boyfriends, etc didn’t take nightly shifts outside until he was caught red handed. Obviously you realized the police weren’t going to catch him.
Sandie – I don’t know why Morgan didn’t yell – was she asleep and something was put over her face like a rag with chloroform, or was she hit in the head, and that’s what caused the red mark on her forehead, or was a hand put over her mouth with a knife to her throat, or was she told if she yelled her puppy or parents would be killed? I don’t know, all I know is her panic button was ripped off her nightstand, I know I couldn’t hear the door pad being pushed with our bedroom door closed since we were on the other side of the house, so I don’t know if I would have heard her cry out. We had not heard the door pad buttons pushed for a few weeks at least, at that time, and we had a camera that covered the area from the end of the front porch to the end of the driveway and a motion alarm that would go off if anyone was on the porch (if they went through the planter), but Steve turned it off just before we went to sleep that night because the Sheriff’s had stepped up their patrols, and every time they drove by the house the alarm would go off and we were exhausted, obviously that was a huge mistake, and one we will always regret although he could have gotten in through the garage door, or one of the back sliding glass doors or he could have already been in the house when we returned, as we were all gone and the dogs locked up between 6 pm – 8 pm that night. As far as Morgan’s windows – no one came in through those, and that camera view you see with the baby doe covered her windows, and the motion lights by those windows would have gone off, and we would have seen the person at the window – but those cameras did capture a person that night…just not at her windows.
The clothes she died in were not the same ones she came home in, and she was wearing PJ’s when she went to sleep. Her hands and nails were not tested and I was in shock that they were not! As far as the way she was scared and threatened, the tapping on the windows is the same thing that happened in the subdivision across from us the summer before (and stopped after they had the police dog track him for almost 2 miles before it lost his scent) as well as 4 years before according to Sheriff’s statements, and emails I have received from other women, and it is something that some stalkers are known to do. Morgan’s stalker also followed her in the car and would show up when she was driving home from school, showed up in our backyard at 5:30 am while pitch black when she went to let her puppy out + much more, so he did try to scare her in many ways over that 4 month period, but I have tried to put as much (not all) as possible in this blog, starting at the beginning of her stalking, so if you read all the posts you will probably get a lot of your answers.
And my husband, her brother, her male friends, and myself over that 4 month period did do stakeouts, followed her at night, way behind her car, and much more, but we were unsuccessful – not unusual now that we know what we know, and for over 2 months he lived 3 houses down from us, and the Sheriff’s said they thought he was using night vision glasses, since he was an avid hunter. I will admit I trusted, and believed in the Sheriff’s – I thought all the promises they made were things they were really going to do, and they kept reassuring us that they were close to making an arrest, and if they didn’t she would always be looking over her shoulder, so stupid me, I wanted to believe them. Morgan on the other hand was losing faith fast and that same week she was murdered, two nights earlier, she wanted to have a group of her guy friends (they really wanted to put an end to this) sleep over in the living room so if she heard the stalker they could all run out different doors, and catch him…as there were 4 of them, they were young, and faster then Steve and I, but I asked her to put it off for a week, I believed they were getting close to an arrest, they told me they knew who it was and, because I was worried that with the Sheriff’s upping their patrols one of them might get shot or hurt…another stupid decision on my part.
Praying for you and hoping you find justice. This whole thing is is crazy! My mama heart aches for your mama heart. I will keep reading more and offer my ideas if I have some
Thank you my mamma heart needed that. 🙂
i am a bit confused. I saw you on dr phil, but when I read morgans tox reports, there is nothing about a date rape drug in her system. where did you get that information? I found a site with all of her death records and there is absolutely nothing there. I hope you find peace soon. you need it
On Morgan’s 2nd toxicology results, that were given to us a little over 8 months after her death, which were tested from her gastric fluid (this is after all Morgan’s doctors, specialists, another highly respected forensic pathologist/Coroner in Colorado + many more had told the forensic pathologist that did her autopsy that they did not believe she died from natural causes, which was his conclusion of her first manner of death, and that because there was a felony stalking case open at the time of her death he should have listed her as, at the very least, as undetermined and had an investigation open into her death. This second test also came after he had threatened me that he could have determined accidental overdose or suicide on her first PER, but he did not find any pills or pill fragments in her stomach – this was because I would not back off and wanted to have her death looked into. Well from the moment her body was found the first responders, Sheriff’s, then her doctors, everyone went out of their way to tell us there was no sign of suicide – and then just like I said, 8 months later the contracted forensic pathologist changed her to a suicide basing his decision on her stomach fluid…but here’s the thing, the stomach fluid actually gave us the smoking gun – it showed us + other forensic toxicologist/pathologists that the drugs in her stomach are not anything she had in our house EVER and they actually are all on the date rape panel at the laboratories including the one her samples resides at and were run from. The site you are talking about that with all her death records is not a good or reliable site – all records have been heavily redacted. All information there is self serving to make this case look like something it is not. If you really for one moment in time could read through that site, and believe it then you would have to believe that there are never mistakes made by people in positions of authority, that those people never try to cover up their mistakes, that families of criminals don’t ever try to discredit and lie about the victim and the victim’s family, and on and on.
I am not someone who is out to change the opinion of every person on this planet – all I am saying is if you really want to know the truth please read this whole website, read this whole blog from day one when it started until the end, and then come tell me that you don’t believe something is very wrong with this non investigation. Of course there are some people that don’t want you to know the truth of what was in her stomach fluid or what the levels in her blood really mean, along with so many other things about her death, but I will tell you this, we are not the only ones that know the truth, and her tests results will never change, they do show what happened to her, and it was horrible! Our daughter was murdered and we will keep going until an investigation is open, and the truth comes out – do I think these other people that are trying to disprove us will go away, no, but it doesn’t really matter, the truth exists and will come out for all to see.
We do get upset, we do get angry and we do get frustrated – and I’m sure you would too if you had lost your youngest daughter to a predator, but the reality of the situation is this…we do have peace, we have peace in knowing Morgan is safe, and in a beautiful place, where no one can hurt her, and we will see her again some day, we do have peace in knowing how many people support us and believe in what we are saying, and are helping us push for the truth, we have peace in the love we still feel for Morgan, and the love we still feel she is sending us, we have peace in the love we have from our whole family (which is huge), and all our friends. We also find peace in doing things for others, other victims of violence against women, because that is exactly what happened to our wonderful daughter…we can not bring Morgan back, but we know Morgan would want us to help others so other girls, so other families won’t ever have to go through this.
I admire you for & find strength in the grace & dignity that you handle the nay-sayers with…
~Love & Light~
toni,
I never said I did not believe this was a crime. never at all. I just was wondering about the tox screens.
when I try to go back to day one of your blog, my computer doesn’t allow me to.
also, when I said you need peace, it was not meant as disrespect or anything of the sort. you do need peace. I saw brooks face. she seems less than credible.
I apologize if I offended you. the drugs that were listed on that site were cough suppresents and nicotine.
I do believe your daughter was horribly terrified. and for that I feel horrible for you
may your investigation continue and you find what you are looking for and those involved get what they deserve.
all my love in ny
That’s what I mean about that site not be truthful…Morgan had 5 date rape drugs in her stomach, and they are on her 2nd tox report. Please don’t feel like I am offended – I’m not. I understand most people don’t know what happened so I completely understand that – what I don’t understand is how people could read other sites from people that don’t live in our state and didn’t know Morgan or anything that happened and believe what they read…it’s kind of weird to me.
Thank you for your kind words, and trust me this investigation will be opened, and the people on the Internet that are spreading false information probably won’t go away, but their words are going to sound pretty stupid at that point. Look what has happened in so many other cases – the cyber-bullies just keep going on accusing, and never really stop even though there is no basis in reality.
Our reality is that our 20 year old daughter was stalked and terrorized for 4 months and then heinously murdered –
the only reason I read that site is because it is listed as truth for morgan.com. it seemed like they were trying to help you. they do not have a second tox screen on there.
I completely understand – the truth for Morgan that is out there is anything but the truth…they leave things out, add lies and hope that if they say it all in a good way people will think they are trying to help, but they are not they are the same “group” of people that have been cyber-stalking not only Steve and I, but also any of our supporters that they can. It’s very sad and I do expect them to get worse as they try to convince the world that Morgan was not stalked or murdered. It’s not an unusual or new thing that the family and friends of the criminal go ballistic on the Internet and telephone trying these type of things I have been told this by the Victim’s Rights folks in DC as well as many other people that deal with this, and we have been told to ignore these people, and I do as much as I can.
I am very sorry for morgan. I do think of her everyday. I am 39 and am in end stage renal failure and to see a beautiful life taken without any cause just kills me.
especially since in my case I do not have any choice to but to deal with my fate.
morgan did not have to have this fate.
again, I am truly sorry, and after re reading their site, I did find the second rept. all medication is listed there.
why was this not a concern to the police?
I am so very sorry to hear that, my prayers are with you. The last cancer patient that Morgan volunteered to help was a mother of two boys and she had stage 3 cancer and needed someone to watch her boys for the night because her husband wanted to take her out to celebrate her birthday and their anniversary before she became too weak. Morgan and I felt so taken by this woman because you could tell she was so concerned and attentive to her little sons and we thought how unfair that they were going to loose their mom. Anyway Morgan was found dead on 12.2.2011 and this strong woman fought and did not die until recently – life is always so unpredictable.
The Sheriff’s knew about the 2nd report and the head of the Sheriff’s Department actually came out on the lawn of the Courthouse right after that report came out and announced (on camera) that he felt so sorry for our family but he will NEVER open this case – what Sheriff ever says that about a possible murder case? There is no statute of limitation on murder and one of the Detectives gave a statement to the newspaper just before her boss was on camera and said, “Of course if new evidence or information comes in then this will continue to be an investigation.”
So the Sheriff’s knew – and they obviously could not afford (for whatever reason you want to guess at) to open her investigation. So that is why this investigation, when opened, will not be in this County.
Again, I am truly sorry, you are so young, and don’t deserve to be going through what you are going through. I appreciate you taking the time to read and understand about our daughter’s life and death. Take care! Much light and love to you.
thank you toni. I do believe in my lifetime that there will be justice for morgan. I believe it with all my heart. taking the time to read all available info came naturally to me after seeing you on dr phil. morgan was not suicidal. let me tell you, ppl will not always say when they are, but the signs are there for a mother to see. trust me. you would have known. she would have been irritable (and not just about the stalking) and you would have had the sense that she was “giving up” that Is not what I took from her story.
again, thank u for the prayers as I have no access for dialysis, and will prbly die from this illness
xoxo
Thank you for your kind words and I hope someone out here can come up with a suggestion for you as to how to get access to dialysis – don’t give up hope ever – you never know and I will pray that you get help!
I dont know if this has been asked already or not. But did you yourself search or have someone else search your house for recording devices such as mini cams or mine voice recorders?
No we didn’t but should have…I did ask the Detective about it once and he didn’t think there was anything and Steve bought an inexpensive scanner for listening devices and scanned the car but it didn’t react.