5/16/09 (FL):
Handwriting Expert Gives Opinion on Note at Murder Scene
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Handwriting samples of a Jacksonville man charged with killing his girlfriend in 2007 do not match evidence left at the scene, but that evidence may match a writing sample provided by another suspect who was never charged in the crime, a forensic expert says.
Neighbors suspected something was wrong inside a Phoenix Park apartment on March 10, 2007, and called Jacksonville police at 4:30 p.m. Responding officers found an apartment that appeared to have been ransacked with drawers pulled out and dumped on the floor. They found a 2-week-old infant sucking a bottle in the bedroom. And they found the baby's mother, 27-year-old Lakkysha Marie Glover, dead in the bathroom.
Her body was bent over the side of the bathtub with her face submerged in a half tub of bath water. She was wearing only underwear and a T-shirt. There were no signs of a physical struggle, and the tub water matched the water in her lungs, according to autopsy reports.
On the shower wall, written in a pink felt marker were the words, "U next Charles" with an arrow symbol pointing down at Glover's body.
Glover has a brother named Charles. According to court documents, investigators felt the writing on the shower wall and the ransacking of the apartment were attempts by Glover's killer to throw them off the right track.
Detectives questioned family members of Glover's and another person with a connection to her brother. Then the investigation narrowed on Glover's live-in boyfriend Michael Wolfe.
Wolfe, an unemployed former Marine, had been pushing Glover to get a life insurance policy with him listed as the beneficiary, according to witness statements in the court file.
Wolfe told investigators he was visiting family in Allendale, S.C., when Glover was killed, but cell phone records show his phone made calls in Jacksonville at the time of Glover's death.
"The records clearly reflected Michael Wolfe's cellular telephone connected with a tower in Jacksonville, North Carolina, at the approximate time of the death of Lakkysha Glover," JPD detective Len Condry wrote in his investigative notes.
Police had Wolfe, two family members of Glover's, and the suspect with a connection to her brother to submit handwriting samples. The samples and photographs of the message left on Glover's shower wall were sent to East Tennessee State University for analysis.
Larry S. Miller, a board certified forensic document examiner at the university, told JPD detectives in a January 2008 response to their handwriting inquiry that he could not say conclusively who wrote the words found in the shower.
"However, there were some indications of similarity and dissimilarity to provide a qualified opinion," he said. "Of particular mention were similarities in line quality, proportional spacings, letter formations, beginning and ending strokes and angles."
Miller stated that Wolfe and Glover's two family members more than likely did not write the shower message, but "there are indications (the other suspect) may have authored the questioned material."
With thanks, JDNews, © 2009
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