The Cold Case of the Frozen Man

In July of 1995, a worker mowing the median of I-40 found the body of a man lying in some trees about ten miles west of Knoxville. The autopsy showed a clear cause of death. The man had been shot in the chest.

There were two odd things about this case that Harry London, the detective assigned to the case, was never able to resolve. The first was the cause of death. The bullet the coroner retrieved from the body was a round ball of.58 caliber, the same caliber used by many muskets in the Civil war, and showed no marks that would have been left by the rifling of a rifle of the same caliber. There were a few marks on the ball that looked to the firearms tech like the impression made by a cloth patch around the ball when it was rammed down the barrel. The coroner said those impressions were probably made when the ball passed through the clothing the man was wearing. Microscopic and chemical examination of the powder residue indicated it was old-fashioned black powder.

The second odd thing about this case was the coroner couldn't accurately determine a time of death. The reason is that at some point shortly after death, the body had been frozen solid and the freezing temperatures stopped the decomposition process. The decomposition documented by the coroner indicated the body had been exposed to the elements for about a week, but microscopic examination of tissue samples from various parts of the body all showed significant cell damage. That cell damage indicated the body was frozen at a temperature lower than minus fifteen degrees Fahrenheit.

There was no indication that the body had thawed and then frozen again such as old insect damage or any decomposition other than what was obviously recent. Apparently, the body had been frozen and remained in that state until it was placed in the median. There was no identification found on the body, but the coroner estimated the man's age at between twenty-five and thirty based upon his facial features, tooth wear, and general physical condition.

Based on the clothing the man was wearing, Harry, the detective assigned to the case, estimated the man had been murdered sometime in the late 1960's to early 1970's. The man's pants were bell-bottoms and he had a suede leather vest over a shirt open almost to the waist and with the tie-dyed pattern characteristic of that time period. That meant that the man's body had been frozen for at least twenty years, maybe as long as twenty-five.

As with all unclaimed bodies, this body was held for about a month and then declared as unclaimed. Tissue and blood samples were retained by the Coroner's office and the body was buried in the county cemetery.

When Harry briefed me on the case, he sounded very frustrated.

"Rich, of all the cases I wasn't able to solve, this one had the most information. We had a body, a definite cause of death, his prints, and his DNA. None of that got me anywhere. He didn't show up on any missing persons reports from Tennessee or any of the surrounding states. His prints weren't on file with the FBI or any of those states either. It was the same with his DNA, though DNA was a pretty new thing back then.

"I sent the prints to NCIC every couple years, and the DNA to CODIS when it became available, but the answer was always that there was no match found. What I figure is the guy either had no family to report him missing or else he was transported a long way before he was found. He'd never had a run-in with law enforcement or his prints would have been on file. I don't know how he escaped service in the military because if he was twenty-five sometime between 1965 and 1973 when the military went all volunteer, he'd probably have been drafted for Vietnam.

"Don't feel bad if you can't solve this one. I know you and Rochelle have a great track record, but this case...well, there's a lot of information, but it defies logical analysis."

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In case you've missed my other cold case stories, I'm Richard Owens, and I work cold cases for the Knoxville Police Department. Rochelle Roberts is a writer of crime novels based upon actual cases. We met when I was working for the Nashville PD, and in the process of solving a cold case decided we fit together really well and especially so in bed. Rochelle has a strong libido that requires settling down a few times a week, and I seem to be able to do that for her.

Since Rochelle had a house in Knoxville and I just lived in an apartment in Nashville, we decided I would move to Knoxville. Getting the job with the Knoxville PD wasn't hard. Learning how to live with a woman after being divorced for a lot of years was. Rochelle had the same problem because she was also divorced. We both learned though, and we're still together. We've talked about marriage, but we're both still a little nervous about that kind of commitment. It didn't work out well for either of us the first time.

We're also a good team when solving cold cases because we approach a cold case in two different ways. My method is standard police procedure. I organize the evidence and then formulate a theory or theories about what took place, then gather more evidence to prove or disprove my theories. Rochelle's method is to formulate a possible novel plot and then try to fit the evidence into that plot. It's surprising how often she nails the case down. Between the two of us, we've solved a lot of cold cases, so I guess it works.

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When Rochelle looked at the file for the first time, she read through Harry's report and then looked up at me.

"How could anybody be missing for twenty years without somebody reporting it? I mean, everybody talks to somebody on a regular basis and whoever that person is would probably be a little worried, wouldn't they?"

I shrugged.

"There are a lot of possible reasons that I've seen before. Maybe the man was from another country or at least a state Harry didn't check. Maybe he was homeless and didn't stick around in any one place long enough to become friends with anyone.

"Maybe he didn't want to be around anyone and lived by himself in a rural area. I remember one case where the killer had a cabin about a hundred miles from anyone else and never went anywhere. He had a big vegetable garden and hunted and fished for his meat. His victim was a hunter who stumbled onto the cabin one day and the guy killed him so he wouldn't tell anybody that someone was living there.

"Maybe the rest of his family was dead so they couldn't report him as missing. Maybe he didn't get along with his family and when they didn't see him for a while, they figured it was for the best."

Rochelle frowned and shook her head.

"Somebody had to know he was missing. If they didn't report it, there has to be a reason.

"Another question is why in the world would you keep a body frozen for twenty years and then decide to dump the body in the median of an interstate? For that matter, who would want a body in their freezer for twenty years? Knowing it was there would give me chills every time I opened it."

I chuckled.

"Well, a person who commits murder isn't usually your nice guy next door. My personal opinion is that any murderer isn't right mentally. They're not mentally incompetent or temporarily insane like some defense lawyers try to claim. They know exactly what they're about to do and why they're going to do it. Once they've killed the victim, they aren't sorry for anything except getting caught.

"I say they aren't right mentally because I don't think they really care that they've ended a life. I've questioned a lot of murderers and to them, it's just something they did, like getting dressed or eating. That's not normal. It's not enough to label them as insane, but it's not normal.

"You, I, and everybody else have had the thought that it would be better for everybody if a particular person just disappeared off the face of the earth never to return. The majority or people don't act on that thought because they have respect for not just the law but for the value of human life, no matter how aggravating and obnoxious that person might be. The murders I've arrested don't seem to have that morality."

Rochelle sighed.

"Yes, I suppose that's true. That's how most of the murders in my books turn out. So, where do we go from here?"

I started to list what evidence we had.

"We know the victim was killed with an unusual weapon. The victim's clothing indicates he was shot sometime in the 1970's. It could be earlier or later, but not by much. In the 1970's, muzzle-loading firearms were only used by history buffs, collectors, and a few hunters, so maybe there's something there. We could see if there were any muzzle-loader clubs in the area during that time period. I'll also have our firearms tech look at the ball and confirm what was concluded in the original investigation.

"The fact that the victim was apparently frozen from some time in the 1970's until 1995 also needs a closer look. What that probably means is the killer lived in the same home at least during that time period. Trying to move a freezer big enough to hold a human body would involve shutting it down, moving it, and then starting it up again. That would take at least a couple of days.

"That much time would have at least partially thawed the body but the Coroner apparently didn't see that. I'll ask the Ron to look at the autopsy report to see if he sees anything different than the original Coroner did. Technology has advanced a lot since 1995, so maybe he'll see something different."

Rochelle nodded.

"Harry might not have checked for missing persons on NamUS, so I'll do that. I'll also look at any muzzle-loader clubs or events in the area in the 1970's.

"Something else bothers me about this one. According to the report, the body was dumped in some trees in the median of I-40 west of Knoxville. There aren't any trees in the median of I-40 until you get to the interchange with I-75 and that's further than ten miles. There are trees on either side though. Either the body wasn't found in the median or the distance is wrong. I don't know if that matters or not, but it's something I'll look at.

"Another thing that seems wrong is how would somebody stop on the side of I-40, take a body from their car, and then carry it very far without being seen. I-40 is busy no matter the day or time of day. I don't think just one person could do all that fast enough to not be seen by somebody driving past. I think I'll drive out there tomorrow and see what I can see."

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The next morning I took the case file down to Ron Blake, our Coroner. I found him bent over a body on his table. He looked up and waved, but then went back to whatever he'd been doing.

I watched until he pulled something reddish-brown out of the body, put it on the scale beside the table, and then said, "Liver weight one-point-seven two kilograms." Then he pulled off his gloves and walked over to where I stood.

"Morning, Rick. Need me to solve another case for you? One of these days, I'm going to have to start sending you a bill."

I smiled because that was just Ron being Ron. I'm not sure how he can do the job he does. He spent a lot of years becoming a doctor, but what he does now is dissect dead people to figure out what killed them. I suppose a quirky personality helps, and Ron is nothing if not quirky.

"Well, I have a file I'd like you to look at if you have time. If you're busy, I can wait."

Ron grinned.

"Mrs. Elroy isn't going anywhere, and I already know what killed her. I'm just checking the boxes so her family will have a reason to believe me. They aren't going to like it, but it'll be the truth.

"She was fifty-six according to her driver's license, and according to the detective who interviewed her family, she was a widow. She didn't have any male friends, but Wendy, my secretary told me women that old have a hard time finding a good man. She has pretty nice tits though, so I don't know if that would be true in her case.

"Anyway, the family all swears Mrs. Elroy was a good, church-going woman who seemed a little ditzy most of the time after her husband died. They chalked that up to her losing her husband.

"I figured she'd had a heart attack because she was a cigarette smoker and was overweight, but that wasn't it. Her heart was in great shape. Her liver, not so much. I didn't know why until I pulled a tampon from her vagina.

What Mrs. Elroy was, was an alcoholic, but she didn't drink in front of her family. She didn't drink in front of them because she didn't have to. She had a different method of sending herself off into a vodka vacation from reality. Several times a day, she soaked a tampon in vodka and then inserted it into her vagina. I found one inside her and couldn't figure out why because she was past menopause by that age.

"I once autopsied a young girl who thought she could put her coke stash in a baggie and then insert the baggie like a tampon so if she got arrested, the police wouldn't find it. Problem was, she didn't know that when a drug dealer puts the coke in a baggie, he usually manages to make small tears in the plastic. Her body fluids dissolved the coke, the coke was absorbed into her blood stream, and she OD'd.

"Anyway, I had the tampon tested for drugs. Some doctors prescribe an estrogen cream applied to the vagina to help with the hormone changes a woman experiences after menopause and I thought maybe she was using a tampon as an applicator. Once I saw the chemical analysis, I figured out what was going on.

"Her vagina absorbed the vodka and transferred it to her blood stream. From the test I did on her blood, that probably kept her half drunk for about four hours or so because she was about zero point one. Then, it was just rinse and repeat until she was alone at home and could drink without her family watching. Her liver shows it and her vagina looks like a lab specimen kept in a bottle of alcohol for several years.

"Now, what case has you baffled this time?"

I explained the case to Ron and then told him about the fact the body had apparently been frozen for over twenty years. I asked if he could look at the autopsy report and the tissue slide and see if he saw anything different.

Ron smiled.

"So, you want me to see if the guy had freezer burn?"

Ron said to give him a day and he'd get back to me.

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When I got back to my desk, I was having second thoughts about putting this case ahead of some of the others Harry had passed on to me. In 1970, the population of Knoxville, Tennessee was about a hundred and seventy-five thousand. Add the suburbs and it was probably over two hundred thousand. That meant Rochelle and I had at least a hundred thousand potential suspects.

That fact made finding the killer more difficult because we didn't have the name of the victim. With a name, a detective can start looking for past police and financial records, people the victim might have known, and where that person lived. With that information, the detective can begin theorizing about motives and motives often lead to the criminal. Without a name, a detective is in the position of a kid playing the old game of pin the tail on the donkey. He's blind and just poking at possible clues in hopes of hitting something important.

One technique I'd used in the past was to look for names of people who have committed the same crime by a similar method. I had no legitimate reason for thinking whoever killed this guy would do it again, but that's often the way it works out. The killer seemingly gets away with one murder and decides to try it again. Those arrest records should be in NCIC, but like all government offices, hiccups happen for a variety of reasons. It was possible the killer had been arrested for a similar crime and Harry had just missed it.

More often than not, killer and victim are about the same age give or take maybe ten years. If my victim was killed in 1970 and was twenty-five at the time of his death, the killer would probably have been between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five. I decided to discard any arrests of people under the age of twenty-one. It was possible the killer could have been younger than twenty-one, but anybody that young probably wouldn't have their own freezer.

If the killer was twenty-one in 1970, he'd have been forty-six in 1995 when the body was dumped. That maybe answered Rochelle's question about how one person could haul a body out of a car and into some trees by himself.

According to the Corner's report, the victim was five-eight, and would have weighed about one-fifty. One man carrying a body that heavy into the trees wouldn't have been easy, but it wouldn't have taken him very long either. When I was in Basic Training, I carried a guy about that big on my back for about eighty yards before my legs gave out and I was running at the time. I carried men who out-weighed me by fifty pounds during my stint at the police academy. If the killer was even the same size, it wouldn't take him more than a few minutes to carry the body the fifty feet or so into the trees.

I started my NCIC search with Knoxville for the years from 1970 to 1995, and an age of twenty-one to forty-seven. That got me a list of about a thousand names, so I needed to narrow my search. I added "murder", "attempted murder" and assault to my search criteria and that weeded the list down to about five hundred. Of those, most were already in prison in 1995 so they couldn't have dumped the body in 1995. There were about fifty who had done their time and apparently hadn't been in trouble since then and another fifty who were charged but never convicted. That left me a hundred people to find and talk to.

The problem with that search was it was limited to the general area of Knoxville. Since the body was found along I-40, the murder could have happened almost anywhere in the US. That brought the number of possible killers to millions instead of just a hundred or so. There was no way that was going to work.

What I really, really needed was a name to attach to the body. With a name, I could find out things like birthplace, last known residence, marital status, and a host of other personal details that would help my investigation. Without a name, I was just poking around blind with a donkey tail in hopes of hitting the donkey on the ass.

I was getting ready to call it a day and go home to see if Rochelle had come up with anything when Ron called me.

"Rich, you got a few minutes? I looked at the autopsy you left me and there are some things that don't make sense to me."

Five minutes later, I was sitting in the chair beside Ron's desk. He frowned.

"Rich, the Corner back then didn't really do a bad job, but it wasn't great either. I fished the tissue slides from the case out of the archives and had a look at them. He was right in stating that the body had been frozen solid. His estimate of the number of years is pretty suspect, but there's really no way to determine how long a body has been frozen. Once it's frozen, it'll stay that way unless it's thawed out.

"A steak in your home freezer will develop freezer burn because the surface of the meat is exposed to air in the packaging. Water in the meat comes out and forms ice crystals on the surface. That gets worse if the meat alternates between frozen and only partially frozen, like when you defrost your freezer. Most freezers today have an automatic defrost cycle to take care of any moisture that enters when you open the freezer to take something out. They have heaters that raise the air temperature slightly above freezing so any frost melts and gets drained away. In the process, the surface of any meat slightly thaws enough that it develops what they call freezer burn.

"The pictures of the body and the tissue samples don't show much evidence of that happening except for some discoloration of the skin, so it looks to me like once the body was frozen, it stayed that way until it thawed after being placed in the median of I-40. That would probably never happen unless the freezer was sealed and never opened once the body was placed inside. It's hard to believe that would be the case. There would probably have been at least a little air seeping into the freezer and if the freezer wasn't defrosted, it would build up as ice.