Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / SPECIAL WEEKEND CRIME STORIES UPDATE: Hubby's 'PROS & CONS' LIST TO 'KEEP' PREGNANT WIFE Found After She is Found Dead

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SPECIAL WEEKEND CRIME STORIES UPDATE: Hubby's 'PROS & CONS' LIST TO 'KEEP' PREGNANT WIFE Found After She is Found Dead · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I want you to just
0:15
Speaker 1: let this thing in. Let's say it's a Google search, Okay,
0:21
Speaker 1: and here we go. Quote what to do if husband
0:26
Speaker 1: is upset You're pregnant. Repeat what to do if husband
0:34
Speaker 1: is upset you're pregnant. That was the final Internet search
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Speaker 1: of Jennifer Rothwell before she was bludgeoned dead. I Nancy Grace,
0:52
Speaker 1: this is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us
0:55
Speaker 1: here at Fox Nation and Series XM. What to do
0:59
Speaker 1: if your husband's upset you're pregnant. Well, for one thing,
1:03
Speaker 1: get any husband, or just get rid of that one.
1:05
Speaker 1: You don't necessarily need any one. I'm just thinking about
1:10
Speaker 1: this woman, Jennifer Rothwell. She's just twenty eight years old.
1:15
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, her naked body was dumped in the woods
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Speaker 1: off Highway sixty one in Missouri. Then hubby, I don't
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Speaker 1: even want to say his name, but I will for you.
1:28
Speaker 1: Bo Rothwell reports her missing, sends concern text to her
1:34
Speaker 1: cell phone, and then has the utter gall to go
1:38
Speaker 1: out and pretend he's searching for her. Oh well. The
1:45
Speaker 1: jury has handed down a verdict in the case against
1:50
Speaker 1: Bou Rothwell, age thirty one, being tried for the murder
1:55
Speaker 1: of his pregnant wife, Jennifer. How did the whole thing start?
2:01
Speaker 1: Bo and Jennifer's romance begins while they are both studying
2:04
Speaker 1: engineering at the University of Lussouri, Columbia. In twenty fifteen,
2:09
Speaker 1: they say I do and move to Saint Louis for work.
2:12
Speaker 1: Jennifer Rothwell is a chemical engineer at m Ecs Inc.
2:16
Speaker 1: In Chesterfield. Bo Rothwell works at and Bateech now called
2:20
Speaker 1: Zachary Engineering in the Saint Louis area. Soon the couple
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Speaker 1: turns their eyes on becoming parents, and just one year later,
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Speaker 1: they get the good news a baby is on the way.
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Speaker 1: It sounds like a dream come true, and it is.
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Speaker 1: It's what everyone wants, the American dream. A beautiful hall,
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Speaker 1: a lovely family, a baby finally on the way, awesome
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Speaker 1: careers in front of them. And then somehow, in the
2:45
Speaker 1: midst of all this happiness, she disappears, her family, her parents,
2:51
Speaker 1: her husband devastated. Take a listen to Robert Townsend ks DK.
2:58
Speaker 1: I talked to Jennifer Rothwell's parents on the phone. Now
3:00
Speaker 1: they didn't want to go on camera. They're big concerned.
3:03
Speaker 1: Is just hearing from their daughter. I'm gonna step back
3:05
Speaker 1: and you can see right now. Saint Louis County Police
3:07
Speaker 1: they are here sitting in two vehicles on Rothwell Street.
3:11
Speaker 1: They've blocked off this street. Officers are going in and
3:14
Speaker 1: outside this house. We believe that they are searching in
3:17
Speaker 1: and out of this house again. The family's house here
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Speaker 1: off North Winds Drive in West Saint Louis County, searching
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Speaker 1: for possible evidence. I believe in connection with this woman's disappearance. Again,
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Speaker 1: this is what I know. Jennifer Rothwell as twenty eight
3:30
Speaker 1: years old and married. She's five foot six inches tall.
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Speaker 1: She has long, light brown hair, curly hair. She weighs
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Speaker 1: about one hundred and fifty pounds now. She was last
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Speaker 1: seen leaving her West Saint Louis County house yesterday morning
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Speaker 1: and six weeks pregnant with me an all Star panel.
3:49
Speaker 1: But let me first go to Christie Missouri joining us
3:51
Speaker 1: any award winning investigative reporter. Christie, thank you for being
3:55
Speaker 1: with us. Now. This took place in Crere, Missouri. Tell
3:59
Speaker 1: me about that. It's a lovely, family oriented community. Neighbors
4:04
Speaker 1: know everybody else. So for this woman to just vanish
4:10
Speaker 1: in thin air without a trace was very unnerving to
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Speaker 1: her neighbors. So is it apartments their homes? This is
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Speaker 1: a it's a lovely little, lovely little suburbia. It's utopia.
4:26
Speaker 1: What were their jobs, Christie, Missouri? Where did they work?
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Speaker 1: They were engineers, So these are learned people making very
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Speaker 1: good salaries, upper level income. So these are meticulous people.
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Speaker 1: That's why when she went missing it was so out
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Speaker 1: of the ordinary because both of these people, separately and
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Speaker 1: as a couple, had every moment of their day documented
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Speaker 1: with a calendar. Oh my goodness to Dr Bethany Mark
5:00
Speaker 1: joining me High PROFILESLACHO analysts find her at doctor Bethany
5:04
Speaker 1: Marshall dot com Doctor Bethany. The reason I'm asking about
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Speaker 1: the area is the first thing you want to do
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Speaker 1: is look at the area if it has a high
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Speaker 1: crime rate. To have there been a string of break ins? Um,
5:17
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember, Jackie, look this up
5:19
Speaker 1: for me. I recently covered a pastor's wife who was pregnant,
5:28
Speaker 1: who was the victim of a home invasion and her
5:33
Speaker 1: other baby was home at the time. I think it
5:37
Speaker 1: was like a two year old son was home, and
5:40
Speaker 1: of course all the suspicion went on the pastor the
5:44
Speaker 1: young pastor at first because he had been at the gym,
5:48
Speaker 1: So it led to suspicion on the pastor and the
5:52
Speaker 1: next thing you know, it came out that there had
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Speaker 1: been several burglaries in the neighborhood. Did you find it, Jack,
5:59
Speaker 1: Amenda black got sitting That's right, Amanda Blackburn. Now I
6:03
Speaker 1: remember exactly, Amanda Blackburn, just beautiful, like a seer face
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Speaker 1: right in front of me, and everyone was questioning the
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Speaker 1: pastor because of his early morning gym trip. It turned
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Speaker 1: out to be this group of burglars and they wouldn't
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Speaker 1: even get very much to get, like a TV or
6:21
Speaker 1: a DVD player. They broke into her home and I
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Speaker 1: think the door was unlocked Bethany as I recall, and
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Speaker 1: murdered her so she wouldn't be a witness. Awful. So
6:35
Speaker 1: that's why I'm saying, what kind of an area is
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Speaker 1: at high crime low crime? But I also find it
6:41
Speaker 1: interesting what Christy Missouri said that these two I'm talking
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Speaker 1: about Jennifer and husband Bow, They're about to have their
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Speaker 1: baby young and love the whole thing. They're so meticulous.
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Speaker 1: It's very rare that you see in a low crime
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Speaker 1: area someone just go missing. Now, if she left the
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Speaker 1: area on her way to work or on her way
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Speaker 1: to the grocery store, that changes the whole scenario. But
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Speaker 1: you don't see a lot of people just vanish when
7:13
Speaker 1: they're the kind of person that has day and date,
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Speaker 1: you know, every hour accounted four. Nancy, this is a
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Speaker 1: beautiful young woman, a high level professional. She's an engineer.
7:25
Speaker 1: She works in a business or in a company with
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Speaker 1: many other people. And one of the first things I
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Speaker 1: would wonder is has somebody fallen in love with her?
7:33
Speaker 1: With somebody obsessed with her? Did she have a stalker,
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Speaker 1: somebody who is making advances to her or wanting to
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Speaker 1: spend time with her. I think that's the first thing
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Speaker 1: I would look at. Who are her friendships, what's going
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Speaker 1: on in her computer? Who did she spend time with?
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Speaker 1: The second thing is this nant? What do you think
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Speaker 1: she's going out to bars at nis six weeks? That's
7:55
Speaker 1: still pregnant. She's not shown you do know I threw
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Speaker 1: up every single old day of my pregnancy starting some
8:03
Speaker 1: guy every day. I have news for you, Nancy, some book,
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Speaker 1: some guy who's stalking her, who has a crush on her,
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Speaker 1: is not going to care that she's throwing up every
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Speaker 1: day and thank you for that. But you know what
8:14
Speaker 1: you said, you said something really interesting. Let me throw
8:16
Speaker 1: this to Matthew Mangino joining US, high profile criminal defense
8:20
Speaker 1: attorney out of Newcastle, Pennsylvania, former district attorney and Lawrence County.
8:24
Speaker 1: And the reason I emphasize that is you cannot be
8:27
Speaker 1: the district attorney or an assisted district attorney without trying
8:31
Speaker 1: a lot of cases. He knows his way around the courtroom.
8:34
Speaker 1: Author of the Executioner's Toll. You can find me at
8:37
Speaker 1: matt Mangino dot com. Matthew when she said, when doctor
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Speaker 1: Bethany said they're highly trained, highly learned engineers, that is
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Speaker 1: a very exact science. And Bethany also said she works
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Speaker 1: with a lot of people, which is true for engineers.
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Speaker 1: In my mind, I thought she works with a lot
8:57
Speaker 1: of men. That's true. That's a male dominant ned occupation.
9:02
Speaker 1: And when you work with a lot of man, that
9:04
Speaker 1: heightens the likelihood that one of them is going to
9:07
Speaker 1: get a crush on you. Well, yeah, that's certainly a possibility,
9:10
Speaker 1: and that's something that I'm sure the police would consider
9:16
Speaker 1: immediately upon learning of her disappearance. Obviously, we know from
9:22
Speaker 1: news accounts that they're searching the home, which is the
9:26
Speaker 1: first place that they're going to look when someone comes
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Speaker 1: up missing, as you mentioned earlier, the preacher. You know, unfortunately,
9:33
Speaker 1: they're going to look to people who have close contact
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Speaker 1: with her. They're going to look to the husband immediately,
9:39
Speaker 1: just to make sure that that that there's some basis
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Speaker 1: for not looking further at him. They want to eliminate
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Speaker 1: the husband first of all, you know, but they're but
9:53
Speaker 1: they're looking in the home, so we know that there
9:56
Speaker 1: might be some information there that they're interesting, and that's
10:02
Speaker 1: where they're going to find out her every move. These
10:05
Speaker 1: two have been married for four years, and she's last
10:08
Speaker 1: seen alive that morning, leaving for her job as a
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Speaker 1: chemical engineer, straight out to John Guard, joining us chief
10:16
Speaker 1: deputy with Pitt County Sheriff's Office in Greenville, who specializes
10:21
Speaker 1: in cases just like this one. You know, Jennifer Rothwell,
10:26
Speaker 1: it strikes me how organized she was, so it should
10:30
Speaker 1: have been easy for police to figure out where she
10:34
Speaker 1: would have been at the time she went missing, John Guard,
10:37
Speaker 1: because isn't all of that saved in the cloud? Absolutely, Nancy,
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Speaker 1: And that's one of the first things, you know, we're
10:43
Speaker 1: going to do in any case that begins maybe as
10:46
Speaker 1: a missing person, She're gonna examine that digital footprint, and
10:49
Speaker 1: then you know, there's a lot of legs that go
10:52
Speaker 1: off that footprint, connect to other people and other information,
10:56
Speaker 1: and you're just going to run that information down and
10:59
Speaker 1: see where it takes. It sounds like the police did
11:03
Speaker 1: what we normally do in cases like that and did
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Speaker 1: a really really good job, learning a lot in hindsight,
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Speaker 1: as I'm sure the investigators worked in the case. I
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Speaker 1: saw you know firsthand, but there was a lot of planning,
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Speaker 1: not only you know in her daily life and what
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Speaker 1: Jennifer did. She certainly lived by a calendar Crime Stories
11:39
Speaker 1: with Nancy grace Well. The jury got it right. Bo Rothwell,
11:45
Speaker 1: thirty one, convicted in the murder of his gorgeous young wife,
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Speaker 1: pregnant twenty eight year old Jennifer Rothwell. Now he says
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Speaker 1: he was in a quote red haze of her. What
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Speaker 1: is that supposed to make me think it's less than
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Speaker 1: a murder because you claimed you were quote angry. Oh,
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Speaker 1: I get angry every day, but I don't want to
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Speaker 1: murder my husband. I love him and he absolutely puts
12:13
Speaker 1: up with me. The last thing that happens to me
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Speaker 1: when I met at David it is for me to
12:19
Speaker 1: go into a quote red haze of anger. No, I'm
12:25
Speaker 1: looking at Jennifer Rothwell's picture right now and I'm just
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Speaker 1: imagining her and what she lived through when she was
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Speaker 1: bludgeoned dead with a mallet. This was not a person
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Speaker 1: that is prone to high risk behavior. She's not out
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Speaker 1: on the corner hooking. She's not going into bad areas
12:45
Speaker 1: trying to score a rock a crack. She's not into
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Speaker 1: any in the Fairy's activity. She has a very regular schedule,
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Speaker 1: and she's six weeks pregnant. Long story short. The fact
12:58
Speaker 1: that this woman just drops off the app, it's very
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Speaker 1: very uncommon. Take a listen to our friends at crime
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Speaker 1: online dot Com. Jennifer Rothwell was last seen leaving her
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Speaker 1: West Saint Louis County home. Bo Rothwell says Jennifer left
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Speaker 1: for work at six twenty that warning. As Bo Rothwell
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Speaker 1: begins getting ready for his own day, Jennifer Rothwell calls
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Speaker 1: four times, but Bow misses the calls. Rothwell texts his
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Speaker 1: wife during the day, but there's no replies. Rothwell reports
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Speaker 1: Jennifer as missing. I mean the car as I recall,
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Speaker 1: was a Hundai Sonata, right, Christy, Missourich correct in a
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Speaker 1: pretty common car. So I'm just wondering if they had
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Speaker 1: NAV in that car, navigational tracking, which I love, John Guard,
13:48
Speaker 1: Chief Deputy Pitt County Sheriff's Office nav systems and cars,
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Speaker 1: they're a huge benefit to police. But well, you guess
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Speaker 1: somebody that may have a used car or an older
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Speaker 1: car no good. And this one is a twenty eleven
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Speaker 1: Hundai Sonata. Yeah, I'm thinking that's a little older than
14:04
Speaker 1: would not come with the GPS and may have. So
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Speaker 1: the only thing I can think of right now if
14:12
Speaker 1: they're really trying to piece together where her car went,
14:15
Speaker 1: is the case missing Connecticut Mamma fied Jennifer Dulos her husband.
14:21
Speaker 1: No doubt in my mind Fotus Dulos was having an
14:23
Speaker 1: affair with the girlfriend with Shelta Cronis, and I have
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Speaker 1: no doubt in my mind that he murdered her. She's
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Speaker 1: not missing, she's dead. But what police did in an
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Speaker 1: effort to find her. They got every ring, doorbell, every business,
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Speaker 1: every resident, surveillance video, red light cam, stop cam, bridge cam,
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Speaker 1: told him everything. They even got a camera. This is amazing.
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Speaker 1: When a public bus opened its doors, the camera caught
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Speaker 1: the husband going by in the vehicle. Then hip, of
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Speaker 1: course take the murder car to the car wash to
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Speaker 1: have the car detailed. Even changing out the back seats
15:06
Speaker 1: didn't really help because his wife's blood and hair was
15:09
Speaker 1: found on the seats. Long story short, We can work
15:14
Speaker 1: wonders with surveillance video, but not with the nav system
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Speaker 1: in this car. But speaking of the car, suddenly we
15:25
Speaker 1: get a break in the case and the search for
15:28
Speaker 1: Jennifer Rothwell. Take a listen to our France at crime alone.
15:31
Speaker 1: Jennifer Rothwell's car is found the same day she has
15:34
Speaker 1: reported missing, a little over a mile from her home.
15:37
Speaker 1: Around nine thirty the twenty eleven Honday, Sonata is found
15:41
Speaker 1: on the side of the busy intersection. It did not
15:44
Speaker 1: appear to have been in a crash and was otherwise drivable,
15:47
Speaker 1: so the police tagged the vehicle as abandoned. After the
15:50
Speaker 1: owner was identified. Jennifer's phone was found inside. Okay, she
15:54
Speaker 1: didn't make it very far, did she? Just About a
15:59
Speaker 1: mile from her home about nine thirty am, personatas found
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Speaker 1: on the side of a busy intersection. It had not
16:08
Speaker 1: been in a crash. It was not on empty, it
16:12
Speaker 1: did not have a flat tire. What does that mean?
16:16
Speaker 1: Let me go out to you, Matthew Mangino. Was she
16:19
Speaker 1: forced off the road? There's not a mark on her car.
16:23
Speaker 1: Why did she pull over? Did she suddenly get sick?
16:26
Speaker 1: Was she nauseus from being pregnant? I mean, what is
16:29
Speaker 1: that telling you? The car has found about a mile away? Well,
16:33
Speaker 1: that's really a concern. I think that it changes the
16:37
Speaker 1: focus of the investigation. At first, you're thinking about a
16:42
Speaker 1: person who is missing, maybe maybe there's some reason she
16:45
Speaker 1: went someplace, and you're trying to figure that out as
16:48
Speaker 1: quickly as you can. But now you find your car
16:51
Speaker 1: alongside the road. That changes the dynamics of this investigation.
16:56
Speaker 1: Now it appears that something sinister may have happened here.
17:00
Speaker 1: And again this is where I think you begin to
17:03
Speaker 1: grab videotape that you can from from neighboring businesses. You
17:08
Speaker 1: said it was a busy intersection. You start looking at
17:10
Speaker 1: all those possibilities of gaining additional information. But I think
17:15
Speaker 1: that finding this car a mile away without any damage
17:18
Speaker 1: or it's not incapacitated in some way, but it does
17:24
Speaker 1: point to something nefarious. Nancy Nancy, do you remember that
17:30
Speaker 1: can go to you? Go ahead, doctor Bethany. Remember the
17:33
Speaker 1: case we covered years ago where there was a college
17:36
Speaker 1: student coming home late at night from a party at
17:39
Speaker 1: her college and the car was found on the side
17:42
Speaker 1: of the road and they found for valance, yes, that
17:46
Speaker 1: a group of boys had forced her off the road
17:49
Speaker 1: just before she was going over a bridge, and that
17:53
Speaker 1: was the only clue they had. I mean, I'm not
17:55
Speaker 1: saying that's the same in this case, but when a
17:58
Speaker 1: single woman's car is found on the side of the road,
18:01
Speaker 1: I sometimes wonder. I mean, have you ever had somebody
18:04
Speaker 1: scary follow you in your car? I have a number
18:07
Speaker 1: of times in mind, and it's very frightening. You try
18:09
Speaker 1: to find the nearest police station, you try to stumble
18:13
Speaker 1: for your cell phone. But I would wonder, you know,
18:15
Speaker 1: if there's any surveillance, any footage that shows that there
18:19
Speaker 1: was somebody who tried to force her off the road. Well,
18:21
Speaker 1: this is also another interesting fact about her car being
18:24
Speaker 1: found not flat, not empty, not banged up, no crash.
18:28
Speaker 1: It was also at a busy intersection, so you would
18:32
Speaker 1: think if someone was going to kidnap her, steal her away,
18:36
Speaker 1: or force her in or out of the car. It
18:39
Speaker 1: would have been spotted, but we have no witness. I
18:42
Speaker 1: know it was early in the morning, but people are
18:44
Speaker 1: up and about on the interstate heading to airports, heading
18:48
Speaker 1: to work like she was at six o'clock in the morning.
18:51
Speaker 1: What can we learn from this car? Take a listen
18:53
Speaker 1: to Robert Townsend ks DK cream Corps. Police located a
18:58
Speaker 1: car not far from this house the same day, near
19:01
Speaker 1: the intersection of Olive and Fife Road. Liars of the
19:04
Speaker 1: missing woman are posted right now inside several businesses in
19:09
Speaker 1: this very neighborhood. Police also tell us Rothwell's family and
19:13
Speaker 1: friends usually talk to her every day, but again, they
19:16
Speaker 1: have not heard from this woman since Jennifer left home
19:19
Speaker 1: early yesterday morning, and that's why they filed a missing
19:22
Speaker 1: person's report. Police say Rothwell's husband, all of her relatives
19:26
Speaker 1: and family members they spent that they talk to them.
19:29
Speaker 1: They just want to know where this woman is. Again,
19:31
Speaker 1: police tell us this young lady has never disappeared before.
19:35
Speaker 1: Back they're live again. You see a very active scene
19:37
Speaker 1: in this neighborhood. Saintlis County police right here sitting into vehicles.
19:40
Speaker 1: They are also asking anyone who sees Jennifer Rothwell to
19:45
Speaker 1: call Saintlais County Police immediately. As the search intensifies, of
19:50
Speaker 1: course focus turns to the husband. But he bo Rothwell
19:57
Speaker 1: is the one that call nine one one. And so
20:00
Speaker 1: often when husbands are suspected in a wife's disappearance or
20:04
Speaker 1: even murder, they're not the ones that call nine one one.
20:08
Speaker 1: I mean, look at barrymore Few. He didn't call nine
20:11
Speaker 1: one one. He called his daughters to call a neighbor,
20:16
Speaker 1: and I think the neighbor is the one they call
20:19
Speaker 1: nine one one. He goes on and on as I
20:21
Speaker 1: would call in Scott Peterson, her parents called nine one one,
20:26
Speaker 1: not him. Let me understand, that's Christy, Missouri joining us.
20:31
Speaker 1: She's last seen it at six thirty a m. And he,
20:34
Speaker 1: the husband, does call nine one one. But isn't it
20:37
Speaker 1: at nearly ten o'clock at night when he calls nine
20:41
Speaker 1: one one? Correct, when she doesn't return from work. Now,
20:44
Speaker 1: mind you flashback to what he said earlier in the
20:47
Speaker 1: day she leaves for work, he misses a few phone
20:50
Speaker 1: calls from her, and she never responds to his phone call.
20:55
Speaker 1: So that huge gap of time, all of these missed
20:58
Speaker 1: phone calls in the morning, he waits until ten pm
21:02
Speaker 1: to finally say something's wrong here. I haven't heard from
21:04
Speaker 1: my wife in over twelve hours. Well, another thing, I
21:07
Speaker 1: don't think that she normally gets home at ten o'clock
21:09
Speaker 1: at night. From where sure, because if she's going in
21:12
Speaker 1: at six thirty, especially a lot of her being pregnant.
21:15
Speaker 1: He waited until nearly ten o'clock at night. That steel
21:20
Speaker 1: is not damning, but it was enough for her family
21:24
Speaker 1: to be concerned because she spoke to them on a
21:28
Speaker 1: daily basis. So when dinner time rolled around that day
21:31
Speaker 1: and they hadn't heard from Jennifer, when they questioned Bo,
21:35
Speaker 1: he said, well, I tried calling her this morning. She
21:37
Speaker 1: hasn't answered her phone. That started putting up some concerns.
21:42
Speaker 1: When you hit a wall, I always start over again.
21:48
Speaker 1: Matthew Mangino, a high profile lawyer out of Newcastle, former
21:52
Speaker 1: Distrie attorney. Once you follow all your leads and you're
21:55
Speaker 1: going nowhere, you start all over again. With this scenario,
22:00
Speaker 1: with the witnesses, with the rain caams, with the nav system,
22:05
Speaker 1: with the phone calls, with the texts, and of course
22:09
Speaker 1: you'll look at the husband, but I would look not
22:11
Speaker 1: only at the morning she was last saying, I would
22:15
Speaker 1: look at the days leading up to that with you. Well, yeah,
22:17
Speaker 1: there's no question about it. I think, Um, you're exactly right.
22:22
Speaker 1: Once you've you've gone through would appear to be the
22:25
Speaker 1: obvious options here you go back to the beginning. In
22:29
Speaker 1: the beginning in investigations like this is looking at the
22:34
Speaker 1: husband and you want to now get more information about
22:38
Speaker 1: the husband. You want to find out what he was
22:40
Speaker 1: doing in the days leading up to her disappearance exactly,
22:45
Speaker 1: And you're right, you want you want to you want
22:48
Speaker 1: to see his phone, you want to you want to
22:50
Speaker 1: see who he's been in contact with, who he's been
22:52
Speaker 1: talking to, who he's been messaging, and uh, you know,
22:56
Speaker 1: so this this investigation, in this short period of time,
23:00
Speaker 1: has gone full circle. Let's go back to the beginning
23:03
Speaker 1: and let's be more thorough about what transpired prior to
23:10
Speaker 1: her disappearance. Then we find out that he is quite
23:14
Speaker 1: the nate nick. That's always a concern to me when
23:17
Speaker 1: your wife goes missing and suddenly you're out buying bleach.
23:22
Speaker 1: Take a listen to our cut eight our friends at
23:24
Speaker 1: Fox two. Bo Rothwell told officers he last saw his
23:28
Speaker 1: wife at six twenty am at their home when she
23:30
Speaker 1: reportedly left for work. Minutes later, he missed four phone
23:35
Speaker 1: calls from her. Police found the victim's phone in her
23:38
Speaker 1: car abandoned on the side of the road near Olive
23:40
Speaker 1: and Fife. Meanwhile, investigators noted Bo's pick up at their
23:44
Speaker 1: home about a mile away had a strong odor of
23:47
Speaker 1: bleach that seeked from the truck bed. A small window
23:50
Speaker 1: to the garage was opened despite the cold temperatures. Doctor
23:54
Speaker 1: Tim Gallagher, we're now medical examiner for the entire state
23:58
Speaker 1: of Florida. You can find it at pathcaremed dot com.
24:02
Speaker 1: Lecturer University Flora School of Medicine and founder host of
24:06
Speaker 1: the International Forensic Medicine Death Investigation Conference. Doctor Gallagher, why bleach?
24:13
Speaker 1: I mean it's almost cliche. Where you see the killer
24:18
Speaker 1: in line at Walmart behind bleach. These cops get six
24:23
Speaker 1: feet from the husband's truck and they smell bleach. What
24:28
Speaker 1: is in bleach that hurts your nose? Both bleach actually
24:31
Speaker 1: is chlorine bleach and chlorine is a gas. It's a
24:34
Speaker 1: very reactive gas and that it'll react with proteins, it'll
24:38
Speaker 1: react with bodily fluids, and it will react with tissue.
24:42
Speaker 1: You know that's present in your nose, and when it
24:45
Speaker 1: does come in contact, it will ignite the nerve endings
24:48
Speaker 1: and it will radiate pain from your nose all up
24:52
Speaker 1: through your face. So another thing I wanted to point
24:55
Speaker 1: out now that I got a chance again is to
24:58
Speaker 1: say places Walmart, Target, you know their surveillance system. You know,
25:04
Speaker 1: we kind of frowned upon these large, big box stores,
25:08
Speaker 1: but we've called a lot of criminals using the surveillance
25:12
Speaker 1: and photography system present. You know after registers at Walmart,
25:16
Speaker 1: end places like Target. Who frowns on big box stores
25:20
Speaker 1: little box stores? Ah, you're right, because I know I'm
25:24
Speaker 1: telling you. So did you say chlorine? It's what's in
25:27
Speaker 1: bleach that that hurts your nose? Right? Chlorine is a
25:30
Speaker 1: guess that its dissolved in a fluid which has been
25:34
Speaker 1: called bleach. But it evaporates very quickly out of the
25:37
Speaker 1: fluid and it goes into your nose, reacts with a
25:40
Speaker 1: tissue and ignites the nerve endings, and that's what causes
25:43
Speaker 1: the pain. You know, a lot of people think that
25:46
Speaker 1: bleach alone can get rid of DNA. That's absolutely not true.
25:50
Speaker 1: You need something like myriadic acid like black swan if
25:53
Speaker 1: you really want to do the job right. But I
25:56
Speaker 1: mean you can smell bleach all the way. Hey, that
26:01
Speaker 1: just made me think of something, Doctor Tim Gallagher. Remember
26:04
Speaker 1: in the more Few case where everybody went into his
26:06
Speaker 1: hotel room and said it smelled like chlorine? Would that
26:10
Speaker 1: have been possibly bleach and not chlorine from a swimming pool?
26:14
Speaker 1: Most likely if you just smell it in one room
26:17
Speaker 1: and not all of the rooms, most likely it is bleach.
26:20
Speaker 1: You know that is centralized in that one location. You
26:23
Speaker 1: do know. I could listen to talk all day long.
26:25
Speaker 1: But getting back on track, So we've got the husband
26:28
Speaker 1: cleaning out his truck bed with bleach and he's even
26:33
Speaker 1: opened the garage window, left it cracked open. What to
26:38
Speaker 1: dissipate the odor? Odor of what? But then we find
26:43
Speaker 1: out about a list, You know, doctor Bethany Marshall, there's
26:48
Speaker 1: such thing as being too organized. Take a listen to
26:52
Speaker 1: our cut nine our friends at Fox too. Bo Rothwell's
26:56
Speaker 1: list of pros and cons about his mistress. Roth Well
27:00
Speaker 1: wrote it on a work notebook dated five months before
27:03
Speaker 1: the murder. Plus is indicating the pros like better sex, life,
27:08
Speaker 1: more respect, fresh start than he wrote is the cost
27:12
Speaker 1: too high? Under cons indicated by a minor sign half
27:16
Speaker 1: my assets, money, trust is shaken, tainted, my family, disappointment,
27:22
Speaker 1: and take on her kid with his probs. The list
27:25
Speaker 1: did not mention killing anyone. Wow, Chrissy Missourich. A list
27:31
Speaker 1: made out of pros and cons whether he should keep
27:34
Speaker 1: the wife or get rid of her. Do you remember
27:37
Speaker 1: those old Gerito commercials that would run during lawrence Well
27:40
Speaker 1: where the husband at the end would say, I think
27:43
Speaker 1: I'll keep her even as a little girl. That just
27:46
Speaker 1: rubbed me the wrong way. But I didn't know why
27:48
Speaker 1: he made a list of pros and cons about keeping
27:52
Speaker 1: his wife or what trade to get marriage, marriage or
27:55
Speaker 1: mistress that we talked about mistress? What did you just say,
28:02
Speaker 1: go ahead, I'm listening marriage or mistress? Because that list
28:07
Speaker 1: really puts investigators on the trajectory looking further into his phone,
28:14
Speaker 1: who he was talking to, how long he was talking
28:17
Speaker 1: to them, and what exactly he was saying, and then
28:21
Speaker 1: they uncover this whole sordid affair he was having with
28:25
Speaker 1: another woman and some very eye opening text messages to
28:30
Speaker 1: this woman just before Jennifer goes missing. Okay, wait, tell
28:34
Speaker 1: me about the text messages. Well, as we was saying,
28:37
Speaker 1: he was debating marriage or mistress. He claims he was
28:41
Speaker 1: feeling guilty about having this affair and wanted to come
28:45
Speaker 1: clean to his wife. So he and his mistress start
28:48
Speaker 1: texting back and forth, and he said, well, we have
28:51
Speaker 1: three options. Option one is to end things all together
28:55
Speaker 1: and stop chatting. Option two, I'll admit the affair to
28:59
Speaker 1: Jennifer and get a divorce. Option three because now Jennifer
29:04
Speaker 1: is pregnant and he knows this. See have a miscarriage
29:07
Speaker 1: or quote something happens in which case Bo would leave
29:12
Speaker 1: Jennifer for her, And it's that comment or something happens
29:17
Speaker 1: that police focus on. So now we learn not only
29:22
Speaker 1: did he make a pro and con list to dotor
29:26
Speaker 1: Bethany Marshall very quickly. I would hate to think that
29:30
Speaker 1: you could reduce a marriage and a pregnancy down to
29:33
Speaker 1: a pros and cons list marriage or mistress. You know
29:36
Speaker 1: what's missing out of this list is his emotions towards
29:40
Speaker 1: either one of these true two women. There's nothing about
29:43
Speaker 1: his wife being beautiful, what about the unborn child? The
29:46
Speaker 1: unborn child is not really mentioned, his family, anything emotional
29:51
Speaker 1: about the people in his life. He does mention loss
29:54
Speaker 1: of respect, but that's very self referential and it just
29:59
Speaker 1: has to do with him. There's nothing about loving or
30:02
Speaker 1: being attached to anybody else but himself. Crime stories with
30:18
Speaker 1: Nancy Grace. What the jury has handed down a verdict
30:24
Speaker 1: in the case against bou Rothwell, aged thirty one, being
30:29
Speaker 1: tried for the murder of his pregnant wife, Jennifer. What
30:34
Speaker 1: do we know about the night Jennifer Rothwell was murdered?
30:37
Speaker 1: What medical examiners and crime reconstructionists think happened is that he,
30:43
Speaker 1: the husband, bash her in the back of the head
30:45
Speaker 1: with a mallet that sent her stumbling down, and he
30:52
Speaker 1: then followed her as she tried to get crawl away,
30:55
Speaker 1: get away from him, all this pregnant, I might add,
30:58
Speaker 1: and continued to beat her. She was unconscious, and he
31:04
Speaker 1: continued to beat her. Then he started a haphazard cover
31:08
Speaker 1: up of the murder, buying cleaning supplies, tried to bleach
31:12
Speaker 1: his dead wife's blood from the house, drove her car
31:16
Speaker 1: to an intersection, and abandoned it there, tossed a blood
31:20
Speaker 1: stained tarp and the cleaning supplies away together in a dumpster.
31:25
Speaker 1: He claims he went into quote panic mode, That's what
31:29
Speaker 1: he said to the jury. Her naked body was dumped
31:33
Speaker 1: in the woods off Highway sixty one in Missouri. Take
31:36
Speaker 1: a listen to our friends at k s DK. Saint
31:39
Speaker 1: Louis County Police tells me that today they went back
31:41
Speaker 1: to the area that they were last night, hoping that
31:43
Speaker 1: the daylay can help them find any new sort of evidence.
31:46
Speaker 1: Saint Louis County Police Chief John Bellmar says the rain
31:49
Speaker 1: made it even harder to search. This major operation was
31:53
Speaker 1: off the roadway of US sixty one, just north of
31:55
Speaker 1: KK but after six hours of looking, they found the
31:58
Speaker 1: body of a white adult female at eleventh fifteen last
32:01
Speaker 1: night along US fxty one year Hiver River State part.
32:04
Speaker 1: Facebook messages between the husband and his girlfriend show he
32:08
Speaker 1: was very upset when he discovered she was pregnant. Take
32:12
Speaker 1: a listen to our prince at KMO. The Rothwell said,
32:16
Speaker 1: I had mixed feelings. I wanted to be a dad
32:18
Speaker 1: a long time, but I was having an affair. He
32:20
Speaker 1: said he felt guilty about the affair, and I know
32:22
Speaker 1: Vermber eleventh, Rothwell said, my plan was to tell her
32:25
Speaker 1: about the affair, throw myself on her mercy, and hope
32:28
Speaker 1: for the best. Rothwell said he and Jennifer were sitting
32:30
Speaker 1: in the kitchen of their home when he confessed his
32:32
Speaker 1: affair and gave this account of their exchange. I'm really sorry,
32:36
Speaker 1: but I'm having an affair. How dare you expletive? He claims.
32:40
Speaker 1: She shoved him and then said, keep your mystery explative.
32:43
Speaker 1: I've got someone too. Is this even mine? It doesn't mind.
32:47
Speaker 1: The baby's probably not yours. Who is it? It doesn't matter.
32:51
Speaker 1: At least he can get me pregnant. Okay, that sounds
32:54
Speaker 1: like a lot of BS to me. Well, once this
32:57
Speaker 1: guy starts talking here, really, let's take a listen to
33:02
Speaker 1: our cut twelve our friends at KMV. Rothwell says he
33:05
Speaker 1: was standing behind Jennifer and hit her on the right
33:08
Speaker 1: temple with a mallet, then followed her as she stumbled
33:11
Speaker 1: toward the garage. In the heat of the moment, I
33:13
Speaker 1: hit her again. I think I cracked her skull and
33:15
Speaker 1: she fell down the stairs. He said. She was unresponsive.
33:18
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell if she was deceased. But instead of
33:21
Speaker 1: calling on when won for an ambulance, Rothwell said he
33:23
Speaker 1: went into panic mode and started cleaning up every fiber
33:27
Speaker 1: in my body was saying, do something, or I'd die.
33:30
Speaker 1: After killing Jennifer, I thought I had to clean this
33:32
Speaker 1: up and hide what I'd done, he said. After cleaning
33:34
Speaker 1: up the blood, he loaded her body in the back
33:36
Speaker 1: of his pickup and drove without knowing where he was going.
33:39
Speaker 1: Eventually pulled off the side of the road on Highway
33:41
Speaker 1: sixty one near Troy and put her body twenty to
33:44
Speaker 1: twenty five feet off the road and covered it with
33:46
Speaker 1: twigs and leaves. And that's not all. Hey just can't
33:49
Speaker 1: stop talking. Take a listen our cut thirteen, he admitted
33:53
Speaker 1: parking your car along all the boulevardists part of a
33:55
Speaker 1: scheme to claim she had gone missing, and said he
33:57
Speaker 1: knew it was wrong to deceive her friends, but like
34:00
Speaker 1: he had to keep up the facade, so get this.
34:03
Speaker 1: On cross examination, bro Rothwell admitted that he was still
34:06
Speaker 1: in almost daily contact with the woman who was having
34:08
Speaker 1: an affair with. In fact, multiple times a day I
34:10
Speaker 1: spoke with an alternate jurb who the judge said was
34:13
Speaker 1: no longer needed and allowed to go home. She said
34:15
Speaker 1: if she was in the jury room, she would vote
34:17
Speaker 1: for guilty on first degree murder. In fact, she said,
34:20
Speaker 1: quote he's guilty as hell, and listen to what we
34:25
Speaker 1: now learn he did to his pregnant wife's body, then
34:30
Speaker 1: making up this lie about the baby belonging to another man.
34:34
Speaker 1: Take a listen to our cut fourteen KMV. The Facebook
34:38
Speaker 1: messages between bo Rothwell and his girlfriend showed that he
34:41
Speaker 1: was very upset when he found out that his wife
34:43
Speaker 1: was pregnant. This afternoon, detectives presented evidence that there had
34:47
Speaker 1: been a bloody, violent confrontation in the basement of the
34:50
Speaker 1: couple's home. Prosecutors have said that twenty eight girl Jennifer
34:53
Speaker 1: Rothwell's skull was crushed. Her body found dumped along Highway
34:56
Speaker 1: sixty one near Troy. Her clothes had been removed. She
34:59
Speaker 1: was bound with duct teeth and had a plastic bag
35:01
Speaker 1: over her head. In testimony this afternoon, the lead detective
35:04
Speaker 1: testified a by conducting a search at the couple's home.
35:07
Speaker 1: He said there was no sign of forced entry into
35:09
Speaker 1: the home and that in the basement, detectives found reddish
35:13
Speaker 1: circle staining in the carpet and intentions in the wall.
35:16
Speaker 1: During the search of the home, detectives removed basement carpet
35:19
Speaker 1: and carpet padding and showed the stained items to the
35:22
Speaker 1: jury today. It just breaks my heart that this woman,
35:25
Speaker 1: This poor woman, Jennifer Rothwell, expecting her first child, was
35:30
Speaker 1: online looking at a website forum called husband doesn't care
35:35
Speaker 1: first pregnancy forums. What to expect. It's just she was
35:40
Speaker 1: all alone in the world, her husband texting and sleeping
35:45
Speaker 1: with another woman. Even after she goes missing. In other words,
35:49
Speaker 1: he killed her. He's still carrying on the relationship with
35:54
Speaker 1: the mistress. And I noticed when he speaks to detectives
35:59
Speaker 1: he refers to the body. I mean, doctor Tim Gallagher,
36:04
Speaker 1: that was a lot of staging he did post mortem,
36:09
Speaker 1: stripping her nude after he beat her dead in the head,
36:13
Speaker 1: zip tying her wrists, putting a plastic bag over her head,
36:19
Speaker 1: hiding her body. That's a lot of staging, doctor Gallagher. Well,
36:24
Speaker 1: it is, and it's kind of easy to see why
36:27
Speaker 1: he did wrap the head, as we had in other
36:29
Speaker 1: cases before. When there is a head injury, a severe
36:33
Speaker 1: open skull fracture, it bleeds very heavily. We know that
36:37
Speaker 1: the heart keeps pumping the blood through the wound, and
36:40
Speaker 1: it creates a lot of bleeding, more so than you
36:43
Speaker 1: would ever expect. Maybe he was trying to hide that
36:46
Speaker 1: evidence and prevent her from continue to bleed as he
36:49
Speaker 1: transports her well, the alternate jurar was right on. Take
36:54
Speaker 1: a listen to our cut sixteen our friends at KMOV.
36:57
Speaker 1: The jury took only three hours in twenty minutes to
37:00
Speaker 1: reach their verdict tonight, and when they read it out loud,
37:04
Speaker 1: the courtroom erupted with emotion. Jennifer Rothwell's friends and families
37:09
Speaker 1: say they feel a sense of relief and justice. It's
37:12
Speaker 1: a conviction. The state was confident Bo Rothwell would receive.
37:15
Speaker 1: One of the things that came out in testimony was
37:20
Speaker 1: the defendant said with the second hit that he thought
37:27
Speaker 1: he was trying to stop her from getting away, and
37:30
Speaker 1: right there you have deliberation. During Bo's testimony early Thursday,
37:34
Speaker 1: he said it has haunted me every day since Bo
37:38
Speaker 1: Rothwell was charged with first degree murder, tampering with evidence
37:41
Speaker 1: for trying to clean up the crime scene, and abandoning
37:43
Speaker 1: Jennifer's body near Troy, Missouri. That around six thirty Thursday,
37:47
Speaker 1: Rothwell was found guilty on all counts, hanging his head
37:51
Speaker 1: in dismay, but throughout the rest of the courtroom, a
37:54
Speaker 1: sense of relief and justice flooded Jennifer's friends and family.
37:58
Speaker 1: They will live forever without her. No prison term will
38:03
Speaker 1: be enough of a punishment for this husband, so cold,
38:07
Speaker 1: so callous. Take a listen to our friends at Fox too.
38:11
Speaker 1: Rothwell showed no emotions as a judge read the sentence,
38:15
Speaker 1: life without parole. Besides life in prison for first degree
38:18
Speaker 1: murder charge, Rothwell got four years in prison for tampering
38:22
Speaker 1: with physical evidence and four years for abandonment of a corpse.
38:26
Speaker 1: Before a sentence, Rothwell told the court and Jennifer's family
38:29
Speaker 1: and friends, words can't begin to describe how horrible this was,
38:33
Speaker 1: and I'm sorry about what happened. At the yearing, Jennifer's
38:36
Speaker 1: mother appeared on video saying she will never have a
38:39
Speaker 1: chance to hold her child in her arms, and Jennifer
38:42
Speaker 1: will never know the joy of taking her daughter to
38:44
Speaker 1: trick her treating and matching costumes. Investigators say the victim's
38:49
Speaker 1: family finally got the justice they deserved. Well, Bo Rothwell's
38:53
Speaker 1: getting life behind bars. Let that be just a short
38:57
Speaker 1: pit stop on his way to hell. I'm Nancy Grace
39:03
Speaker 1: signing off, goodbye friend.