MULTIPLE GUNSHOT SUICIDES -- A NEW GUINNESS CATEGORY
This is a new category that is really blowing up these days — self-administration of multiple gunshots by a suicide. Guinness will of course require that you die to enter in this category. For a long time, there were no contestants, because most suicides are content to shoot themselves once in the head, and leave it at that, either departing instantly for the realms of their ancestors, or falling over with a brain injury that renders them incapable of further gunplay. Practice for this category includes practicing multiple trigger-pulls with a staccato beat, hoping in this way to kill, as it were, two birds with one stone — first, eliminating the likelihood of survival, and second, possibly carving a permanent place for oneself in the history books.
One of the first entrants in this category was Gary Webb, the author Dark Alliance, the multiple-article expose in the Mercury Sun that exposed the Nicaraguan Contra rebels as the prime suppliers of the cocaine that fueled the crack cocaine epidemic of the '80s, and made Crips and Bloods heroes for all of our children. After telling friends that he was being shadowed by government agents who had tried to break into his apartment, he shot himself multiple times in the head. Click here to see the Sacramento Bee Obituary. While Gary Webb's double-shot suicide has provoked some wild speculation that the Arkansas cops who investigated the case were not very bright, this kind of carping should not detract from Webb's remarkable feat. Nevethelss, while startling, a local Oregon housewife outdid him three years ago, before Webb's suicide was even a twinkle in his own eye.
In 2002, in our nearby burg of Central Point, Oregon, Kerry Repp, the wife of an Oregon State Police academy graduate blew the doors off Webb's record, shooting herself four times with her husband's pistol, while on the phone to 911, screaming her head off. The four bullets had entry points in the face, chin, neck and chest. What a pattern! This woman had the control, the style, that catapults a suicide to the top of the charts.
Of course, it is only great police work that can unearth the evidence necessary to sustain one of these awards. First, the cops must keep an open mind, like they did in the Kerry Repp case, not defaulting out to a conclusion of “murder” simply because it was unlikely that the dead person had shot themselves four times. After all, Sherlock Holmes said we eliminate “the impossible,” before concluding that “whatever remains must be the truth. And in this case, it was obviously not impossible for Kerry Repp to shoot herself four times. At least, it was less impossible than that her cop-husband, Gary Repp, had shot her four times. That was truly unbelievable, so of course there had to be another explanation. Since a skeptical public might easily jump to conclusions hearing about the four gunshots to the corpse, it's important for a police investigator to not blow these incendiary facts out of proportion, and thus the best course is that followed by Central Point Police Chief Mike Sweeny — just refuse to reveal these facts to the media.
Because of my past work as a local prosecutor, I knew Mike Sweeny when he was Medford Patrol Officer, and as far as I could tell he was not blind, nor was he particularly dim-witted. So I must conclude that something told this fine investigator that despite the four shots, there was something about the situation that clued him to the fact that, somehow, this woman had shot herself. Of course, sometimes this means bucking the medical evidence, but in pursuit of the truth, that has to be done:
For a while, justice lost its course. Jackson County District Attorney, who was my boss about ten years ago, couldn't see past the ”obvious,“ and charged Gary Repp with the murder.
Justice took a long time to get back on track, but thanks to the fact that other Oregon State Police Officers kept the faith, like Mike Barnett, writing from freegaryrepp@hotmail.com, ultimately, the truth was revealed. Gary, a father of two and a peacekeeper, was cleared of guilt, and Kerry's place in the record-books was made secure, perhaps forever. Here's what Mike Barnet said in his post at a whiney-cop website called www.guardroom.com, dredged out of Google cache, since the whiners closed down their bitch forum:
[quote="OSP Mike Barnett“]Yes, there are many innocent people wrongly convicted of a crime every year. A very similar case is going on in Medford, Oregon right now. Gary Repp, a ”former“ State Police Officer, was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife. He was not at home at the time of the murder and there is absolutely NO evidence (physical, witnesses, otherwise) that link him to the crime. There is nothing at all, yet the police hold him in jail just because they can. His trial is set for May 2003, but it's very frightening to think that yet another innocent man could be sent to jail for life and possibly get the death penalty for a crime which the police KNOW HE DID NOT COMMIT.
It is a shame with high quality people are falsley accused by the ”law“ in order to hide misconduct within the ”law". The system is out of order and needs to be changed.
Posted by: M. Barnett (freegaryrepp@hotmail.com) on January 14, 2003 07:51 PM
Google cache link[/quote]
Yes, for a time poor Gary Repp sat in jail, and eventually had to stand trial before a jury of his peers, even though there was a suicide note, and even though his wife had sent an email her hotmail account, logging in at Gary’s office at the Medford Armory, and the email said she was depressed. Even though some of Gary’s cop friends swore there was no way he could have killed Kerry and have gotten to the ball game without a drop of blood on him as quickly as he did. He had to stand trial.
Well, eventually a jury saw the truth, but I can’t quote a local newspaper article on the topic, because I think the verdict struck the reporter speechless, or was for some other reason absented from the newspaper’s website. Fortunately, this letter to the editor made it clear that Gary Repp was in fact acquitted:
Yes, I know the author of the letter, because it’s a small town, and Matt Conens used to be a cameraman for local TV. Well his opinion is his opinion, and you can’t unring the bell. Gary Repp’s reputation is ruined. Like Gary Repp’s fellow officer Mike Barnett said, it is a shame when an unfair shadow of blame is cast over a fine person who just had the back luck to live with a suicide who just had to break all the records, and so here is the lesson. If you decide you want to try shooting yourself multiple times as a suicide stunt, you should videotape it, because otherwise you could get someone innocent in a lot of trouble, and you won’t be around to explain it. So go to the extra trouble, videotape yourself shooting yourself, and there won’t be any shadow of murder cast over your relatives, or any question about the nature of your achievement. For example, suppose you decided to empty an entire Uzi clip into your face – that might work, especially if you like jammed a stick between the trigger guard and the trigger. You might end up with thirty rounds in your mug, clearly dwarfing the achievements of past contestants like Kerry Repp. But without video evidence, who would believe it? So why skimp? You only die once, after all.
Timeline- It was simply impossible for Mr. Repp to have committed such a gruesome murder without any bit of blood evidence or powder burns on his person, in his truck, or anywhere- then make it to the ball game within 12 minutes.
Crime scene- There were fingerprints on the gun, but they weren't that of Mr. Repp or Mrs. Repp. The police never followed up to find out whose prints they were. The scene was gruesome, with hand prints and foot prints all around, but they were not those of Mr. Repp. Whose were they? The final gun shot, as reported by a neighbor, was about 20 minutes after the 911 call. Apparently Kerry was still alive during that time and the local police never sent a unit to investigate. The ball game had started 10-15 minutes before.
911 tape- The tape was analyzed and two voices, neither of which were Mrs. Repp, were heard in the background. One male, one female. The male voice did not match the analysis of Mr. Repp's voice.
These are just a few of many key points that were not reported by Sarah Lemon and those alone should give pause to anyone. No one ever doubted this was a murder, especially not Gary Repp. But what everyone should want to know is who was this couple and why/how could they do such a thing to anyone?
HE MURDERED HIS WIFE AND A BABY.
1)Supposedly, according to Gary, the day before Kerry Repp was murdered, she drove from their Central Point home to the Ashland Armory because he forgot his hat. Bear in mind this unit was getting ready to depart in a few days on an overseas mission. Bear in mind that Kerry had a strained relationship with her husband, and according to her friends was glad and relieved that he was leaving the country. So, despite this,she went to the trouble to take him his hat. Then (although she herself was a civilian) she actually went into the armory where the husband she hoped would soon leave was working. And she made herself at home and sat down at a government computer and logged into her personal email account in the midst of all these soldiers getting ready to deploy overseas. Oh, but it gets better! No one seemed to think that story was out of the ordinary, but then we are supposed to believe this pregnant woman jumped up from the armory computer, got back in her car, drove back to Central Point as fast as she could, went home, rushed up the stairs and immediately logged into her email AGAIN at home without pausing for breath. (even though she had just checked her email and was neither sending or receiving anything of importance or expecting to. ) Supposedly in the time frame she could have done this, but barely, and while it seems hardly likely that anyone would behave in this manner, neither the jury nor anyone was apparently bothered by that point either. Are spouses of government employees normally allowed to go in a government office and sit down at a government computer and check their personal email? No. Do spouses of soldiers getting ready to deploy overseas normally go in an armory or military unit and sit down at a government computer and check their personal email? I sure don't think so.
2)Well then, how about this? The morning Kerry was murdered, Gary was supposedly in the house preparing for a camping trip before taking the boys over to the ball field for a team picture. Now since Kerry was clearly murdered, one fact should be obvious. She was not planning to die that morning and had no reason to be logging onto her computer at 08:10 in the morning to compose a suicide email sent to her mother's email address and also to Gary's email address, which was sent at 08:16 - 7 minutes before the fateful 911 call. However, this email according to records WAS composed and sent from her computer in the home where she died minutes later.
So, she did not kill herself and if Gary did not kill her, the person had to be in the house, sitting at Kerry's computer, composing this note while Gary was still there. And according to Gary, Kerry came down the stairs as they were leaving, yelling at them to hurry up because they would be late.
The boys never saw their mother that morning, Gary told them not to go upstairs and not to bother her because she was not feeling well. ( Hmmm - I bet she wasn't, maybe she was already dead.)
And neither Kerry nor Gary were aware that someone was in the house using her computer (if you buy the story someone other than Gary killed her). Someone whose style of writing was totally unlike Kerry's but who used peculiar word choices Gary was known to use and whose style was much like his. And someone who knew information that only Kerry or Gary should have known.
This person who authored this note was the murderer who planned to make the murder look like a suicide. But no other person who could have remotely been considered to have gone in the house and sent this email at this time ever turned up, which leaves only two people who could have done it, Kerry or Gary. But Kerry had no thought of dying that morning and was evidently totally unprepared for what took place. She made one last attempt to call for help by dialing 911 and was ignored. Therefore it seems clear that only Gary could have written this note and there is no explanation for why he should log into his wife's email account and write this if he were not also the murderer. There was no evidence that anyone else was in the house or had used the computer.
But Gary's ability to get to the ball field without any blood on him makes it a lot more believable apparently than that some other person who knew things only Kerry or Gary should know, was in the house using the computer, unnoticed by either of them; no neighbors or witnesses saw any such person either go in the house or leave it, and this phenomenal person who must have committed the murder instead of Gary (since Gary was acquitted) also managed to remove all evidence of ever having been there so as never to even be named as “a person of interest” in the investigation.
And since Gary was acquitted, the case was closed though his only claim to innocence in the whole mess was not having any blood on him when he arrived at the ball field after the murder.
No attempt has been made to find the REAL murderer because everyone knows Gary did it even though he was let go. It seems if Gary WERE innocent, even if his relationship with Kerry was strained to the point he didn't particularly care that she was dead - seems like he would be devoting some intensive effort into finding the REAL murderer just to clear his name. But it would be of course a waste of energy, he already knows who did it and he got away with it so why bother? He might only turn up more evidence to incriminate himself.
Either way, we are letting a MURDERER who killed this woman and her unborn child roam free in our community. What a wonderful justice system we have here, to let a murderer go, just because they would consider “reasonable doubt” not being able to figure out how he got the blood off in time to get to the ball field.
And why was that so hard? After all, it was a pre meditated murder, and planned to look like a suicide, and planned to occur in such close proximity to the perpetrator's public appearance in another place that appearing there without obvious blood would provide an alibi. The only thing that went wrong with the plan was she did not die on the first shot like the perpetrator evidently intended she should.
It should be noted that no police officers or investigation team were waiting at the ball field to scrutinize Gary Repp and determine if there were any evidence of blood on him or not. It seems to me he had plenty of time to get rid of it. The body was not even discovered until some 5 hours later, and it was many more hours before Gary Repp was even found and notified, much less questioned as to his whereabouts at the time Kerry died. And it was several days before it was even admitted the case had to be a homicide rather than murder and that Gary Repp was officially named a “person of interest”.
So WHY was such a big deal made about Gary Repp appearing at the ball field without any blood on him, and that determined to be the king pin of the theory that he could not have committed the murder? No one who saw him at the ball field was looking to see if he had blood on them. Why should they? When questioned about it much later they only remembered they hadn't noticed any, and since no one was looking for it, would have to be fairly obvious to be noticed at all.
Something wrong with that picture. In the first place, the exact time when Gary Repp left the house that morning was never clearly established. Neither was the exact time of his arrival at the ball field clearly established, except he was “late”. The possibility that he had plenty of time to do it was never ruled out. Why no blood? He could have worn gloves, or even something so simple as a rain poncho from the Dollar Store would have been likely to keep the blood off his clothes. Or maybe he wasn't even dressed yet. A bare footprint in blood on the carpet near the body matched Gary's but for some reason was never considered as evidence of his presence at the crime scene. All he had to do was get to the ball field 5 minutes away with no obvious blood on him. No one at the ball field would of course be thinking this man had just murdered his wife and would not be looking at him closely for such evidence. He had plenty of time to change and get rid of his clothes afterward.
Then again, maybe Gary actually committed the murder earlier, and when things did not go as planned, had managed somehow to stage the 911 call to get her blood and teeth on the phone and had previously arranged with the dispatcher to ignore the call so he could get away. There could be plenty of ways to explain how Gary got to the ball field without obvious blood on him; to me the evidence linking him to the case seems much more difficult to explain away.
Mike Barnett claims there was no evidence linking Gary to the case. May Mike Barnett then please explain Gary's story about Kerry checking her personal email on a National Guard computer the day before she was murdered and how some other unknown person got into their house unnoticed the morning of the murder,while Kerry and Gary were both there and managed to boldly sit at Kerry's computer typing a suicide note without any worry that either of them might notice and spoil the plans. And how this other person who knew Kerry and Gary well enough to know information only they would know, and could hack into Kerry's email account and in minutes reel off a suicide note complete with peculiar word choices and phraseology typical of Gary's writing,-how this person could then commit the murder minutes after Gary left the house, and then manage to completely eradicate all evidence they were ever there and escape from the house in broad daylight without being seen or noticed by anyone and be far away by the time the body was discovered and have such an ironclad alibi that they would never ever be suspected or named as a person of interest. Especially if as Mike Barnett suggests there were TWO people, a man and a woman who perpetrated this, whose voices he claims were on the tape and whose handprints and fingerprints and footprints in blood all over the room (but no evidence of them ever entering or leaving the house). If Mike Barnett truly has evidence of these other people who might have been there and done the crime, and especially if he is so anxious to clear Gary's fair name, why doesn't he bring out this evidence and do something about it?
Something should be done to solve this case before this murderer becomes uncomfortble and murders someone else.
That is a portion taken from a posted statement earlier which is so true ” it is impossible to shoot yourself in the back of the head like she was shot, I am glad you are not Sherlock Holmes...
Remember Gary Repp had worked as a Jackson County parole officer in charge of men comitting domestic violence against their wives. He must have heard all kinds of stories and had plenty of opportunity to acquire creative ideas in pullng this off. Poor Kerry did not dare to try to make her escape before he left the country because she well knew he would come after her and erase the trail so justice would never be done. Gary couldn't stand it because he knew once he left the country she would be out of his control, so he made sure she would never escape. Gary knew the justice system inside out so he was able to get away with this heinous crime.... and maybe there are people there who know more about it than they are telling.
Rather than stand up for truth and justice, the prosecution's losing the case was accomplished in a number of ways, to include Huddleson showing up to court sitting in a wheelchair in order to give the jury an official sign of weakness and concession. He said he had been injured doing yard work and thus needed to go to court sitting in a wheelchair. He could have been on his feet or on crutches.
Thousands of people in Medford, Oregon groaned, when they felt that a jury that had been so clearly instructed by the DA Mark Huddleson with his wicked wheelchair antic, let who they think is the murderer of Kerry Repp walk free. Gary Repp had been kept in jail just under two years awaiting his trial, that the DA then deliberately lost. Many feel that less than two years in jail is insufficient punishment for the crime of first degree murder. The DA thinks it was.
Since the trial ended in 2004, Medford, Oregon has experienced an unprecedented jump in crime rates. That is probably due to the wickedness of men like the murderer and Huddleson who the people and voters
there allow to continue in positions of authority to thus continue to do evil and resist truth. For according to Solomon, the people will groan as long as the wicked are in authority.
Trial incompetence may not rise to the level of intentionally losing, but it is understood among local lawyers that Mark Huddleston is not the toughest guy to try a case against. Mark is a canny and capable administrator who usually keeps himself out of trials. Judy Lowry or Angie Lanier or even Doug McGeary would probably all have gotten convictions, but at the time I don't think any of them were available. I suspect Mark was unable to enlist any Deputy DA to pursue the case, because it was such a hot potato, and actually went forward with the best of intentions, but without great passion. I know Mark feels for victims, but by nature he has a calm temperament, and doesn't want to light the emotional fuse that powers a great criminal trial. Please do not view this as an endorsement of Mr. Huddleston, but just as another data point for readers.
:) Chas
One of the first entrants in this category was Gary Webb, the author Dark Alliance, the multiple-article expose in the Mercury Sun that exposed the Nicaraguan Contra rebels as the prime suppliers of the cocaine that fueled the crack cocaine epidemic of the '80s, and made Crips and Bloods heroes for all of our children. After telling friends that he was being shadowed by government agents who had tried to break into his apartment, he shot himself multiple times in the head. Click here to see the Sacramento Bee Obituary. While Gary Webb's double-shot suicide has provoked some wild speculation that the Arkansas cops who investigated the case were not very bright, this kind of carping should not detract from Webb's remarkable feat. Nevethelss, while startling, a local Oregon housewife outdid him three years ago, before Webb's suicide was even a twinkle in his own eye.
In 2002, in our nearby burg of Central Point, Oregon, Kerry Repp, the wife of an Oregon State Police academy graduate blew the doors off Webb's record, shooting herself four times with her husband's pistol, while on the phone to 911, screaming her head off. The four bullets had entry points in the face, chin, neck and chest. What a pattern! This woman had the control, the style, that catapults a suicide to the top of the charts.
Of course, it is only great police work that can unearth the evidence necessary to sustain one of these awards. First, the cops must keep an open mind, like they did in the Kerry Repp case, not defaulting out to a conclusion of “murder” simply because it was unlikely that the dead person had shot themselves four times. After all, Sherlock Holmes said we eliminate “the impossible,” before concluding that “whatever remains must be the truth. And in this case, it was obviously not impossible for Kerry Repp to shoot herself four times. At least, it was less impossible than that her cop-husband, Gary Repp, had shot her four times. That was truly unbelievable, so of course there had to be another explanation. Since a skeptical public might easily jump to conclusions hearing about the four gunshots to the corpse, it's important for a police investigator to not blow these incendiary facts out of proportion, and thus the best course is that followed by Central Point Police Chief Mike Sweeny — just refuse to reveal these facts to the media.
Police probe shooting death
The pregnant Central Point woman died while her husband and two children were away
By BILL KETTLER
Mail Tribune
CENTRAL POINT - Police said Sunday they have no suspects in the shooting
death of the pregnant wife of a National Guardsman who was scheduled to
leave the Rogue Valley this week for duty overseas.
Kerry Michelle Repp's body was found Saturday afternoon in their Central
Point home, near Crater High School. Central Point Police Chief Mike
Sweeny would not say where or how Repp, 29, had been shot.
Her husband, Gary Marvin Repp Jr., 33, was scheduled to leave this week
with the 186th Infantry Battalion of the Oregon Army National Guard for
the Sinai Peninsula. The soldiers leave Thursday for Fort Carson, Colo.,
for two months of advanced training and will then spend six months in the
Sinai Peninsula on peacekeeping duty.
Sweeny said Gary Repp and the couple's two children were away from home on
a trip with other family members when the shooting occurred. Kerry Repp
was about three months pregnant with the couple's third child.
Sweeny said investigators still had not determined how the shooting
happened. ”We haven't determined if there's even a crime at this time. We
haven't been able to conclusively determine if it was a self-inflicted
wound or if she was shot by another person.“
Gary Repp had just finished recruit school with the Oregon State Police
and had been assigned to the Lakeview district, said state police Lt. Dan
Durbin. He was being trained in the Rogue Valley because the Lakeview
district did not have enough troopers to give him field training time.
Gary Repp, a 1987 graduate of North Medford High School, and a 1990
graduate of Southern Oregon State College, also had worked as a Jackson
County probation and parole officer and a Medford police officer.
Investigators came and went from the Repp's Hazel Avenue house Sunday
evening as the search for evidence continued. An American flag and a black
POW-MIA flag hung beside the garage, and petunias bloomed in a planter box.
Durbin said Repp's National Guard orders would most likely be canceled.
”My intention is to contact his superiors (today) and see what his status
is.“
Gary Repp is a captain in the battalion staff office, said Maj. Ron McKay,
chaplain for the Guard unit. He oversees the unit's operations, but does
not command troops in the field.
”The mission will go forward,“ McKay said. ”If he's not available to
perform his duties, there'll be somebody else to step into his place.“
Sweeny said Jackson County's major assault and death investigation unit
will pursue the case. The unit includes police officers from Medford,
Ashland and Central Point, Oregon State Police, Jackson County Sheriff's
Department, and the Jackson County District Attorney's office.
”It's fairly obvious that we're scrutinizing this even more extensively
because (Gary Repp) was involved in the criminal justice community,“
Sweeny said.
Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail
bkettler@mailtribune.com
Because of my past work as a local prosecutor, I knew Mike Sweeny when he was Medford Patrol Officer, and as far as I could tell he was not blind, nor was he particularly dim-witted. So I must conclude that something told this fine investigator that despite the four shots, there was something about the situation that clued him to the fact that, somehow, this woman had shot herself. Of course, sometimes this means bucking the medical evidence, but in pursuit of the truth, that has to be done:
Kerry Repp’s autopsy points to homicideKerry Repp’s autopsy points to
homicide
By SARAH LEMON
Mail Tribune
CENTRAL POINT — An autopsy revealed that a 29-year-old pregnant woman
found dead in her home Saturday was the victim of a homicide — not
suicide, as some had speculated.
Her husband, Oregon State Police Trooper Gary Marvin Repp Jr., was the
only ”person of interest“ police named Wednesday.
”The case is a homicide, and it’s very complex,“ said Central Point police
Chief Mike Sweeny. ”It’s all circumstantial.“
Kerry Michele Repp was shot more than once with the handgun found near her
body, according to Sweeny. Sweeny declined to discuss where on her body
Kerry Repp was shot or exactly how many bullet wounds medical examiners
found in the autopsy, completed late Tuesday.
Gary Repp, a 32-year-old Oregon Army National Guard captain, was scheduled
to leave today for training and then a six-month peacekeeping mission to
Egypt. But police expect him to stay in town, Sweeny said.
The National Guard had no official statement on Gary Repp’s status
Wednesday, said Capt. Scott Granger at the Guard’s 1st Battalion, 186th
Infantry Brigade headquarters in Ashland. Granger said he could not
comment on whether Gary Repp would depart with other Guard troops.
”We’re looking at the best interests of the soldier right now and his
family,“ Granger said.
Sweeny said he understood that Gary Repp’s orders had been changed or that
he was given an extension for his departure date. Police did not request a
change in orders, Sweeny said.
Neither Gary Repp nor members of his family would comment.
Kerry Repp’s family would not discuss the case Wednesday. Her brother,
32-year-old Mike Johnson, said that police asked the family not to talk to
reporters.
A memorial service for Kerry Repp has been set for 3 p.m. Saturday at
First Church of the Nazarene, 1974 E. McAndrews Road in Medford.
Gary Repp graduated from the Oregon State Police Academy last month and
trained for seven days at the regional headquarters office in Central
Point. He officially is on leave without pay because he was called up for
Guard duty in the course of his training, said OSP Lt. Dan Durbin. Gary
Repp was scheduled to return to the OSP — assigned to the Lakeview
District — after a nine-month service with the Guard, Durbin said.
Repp is a former county and state probation officer who quit in December
to become a police officer.
In addition to Gary Repp, police were working either to eliminate or
identify several other persons of interest as suspects in the case, Sweeny
said. They declined to name any suspects in connection with the case
Wednesday.
”We’re working on multiple people,“ Sweeny said. ”Everybody is still a
possibility.“
Investigators were still wading through ”a mountain of physical evidence
and statements“ Wednesday, Sweeny said.
Kerry Repp’s father, Ron Johnson, found her dead in her Hazel Street home
at about 1 p.m. Saturday. Gary Repp and the couple’s two children were at
a T-ball game when the body was found, police said. Investigators
initially were unsure whether the death was a suicide, accident or a
homicide.
Kerry Repp had filed for divorce last month from Gary Repp, her second
husband. But the papers were never served, and the couple was living
together trying to reconcile. Friends told police that the two had a rocky
relationship, Sweeny said.
Donations to an education fund for the Repp children can be made at any
branch of U.S. Bank.
Reach reporter Sarah Lemon at 776-4487, or e-mail slemon@mailtribune.com
Copyright © 2002 Mail Tribune, Inc.
For a while, justice lost its course. Jackson County District Attorney, who was my boss about ten years ago, couldn't see past the ”obvious,“ and charged Gary Repp with the murder.
Repp arrested for wife's murderRepp arrested for wife's murder
He is taken into custody at the state police office, where he was being
fired from his job as a trooper
By SARAH LEMON
Mail Tribune
Former state trooper Gary Marvin Repp Jr. was arrested Wednesday and
charged with murdering his wife.
A grand jury will hear the case Tuesday, said District Attorney Mark
Huddleston.
Gary Repp was arrested at 10:45 a.m. in the Oregon State Police regional
headquarters in Central Point, where he was being terminated from his
employment with OSP, said Central Point police Chief Mike Sweeny.
”We had sufficient probable cause, and it was agreed upon ... that this
was the best time to make the arrest,“ Sweeny said.
Gary Repp was the only ”person of interest“ police had named in the case,
although there were several others who were not identified. Investigators
eliminated all others who either had alibis or who could not have murdered
Kerry Repp, Sweeny said. Gary Repp did not confess to murdering his wife,
Sweeny added.
OSP runs extensive background checks on all recruits and, based on its
investigation, had no reason to believe that Gary Repp wasn't an
”excellent candidate“ for OSP, Lt. Dan Durbin said Wednesday. He stressed
that Repp was to be a probationary employee for 18 months. His on-duty
conduct would have been continuously monitored by a senior OSP trooper.
”We're not so naive to think that there aren't issues in a person's
background that would manifest themselves," Durbin said.
OSP hired Repp in December last year. He graduated from the Oregon State
Police Recruit School on April 12.
Gary Repp also is a captain in the Oregon Army National Guard and was
scheduled to deploy with his battalion on a peace-keeping mission to Egypt
last week. No word on his official status with the Guard was available
Wednesday.
Officials will release little information about the case before it goes to
grand jury, Sweeny said. Details about the autopsy, physical evidence at
the scene and the timeline of Kerry Repp's death all are key elements in
the grand jury testimony and cannot be discussed beforehand, Sweeny said.
Police said last week that Kerry Repp was shot more than once with a
handgun found near her body. Police would not say how many times she had
been shot or the location of the bullet wounds. Police searched the homes
of Gary and Kerry Repp and Gary's brother, Lance Repp, who lives in the
1000 block of Ingrid Street in Medford. The warrants were sealed.
Kerry Repp's graveside service - planned for Friday at Eagle Point
National Cemetery Interment Shelter - was postponed Wednesday. Kerry
Repp's body was released to her husband after last week's autopsy, police
said. A new date for the service was not set.
The Repps reportedly had a difficult relationship, and Kerry Repp had
filed for divorce last month. However, she asked that the papers not be
served, police said. The couple reportedly was living together trying to
reconcile.
Kerry Repp's family would not talk about the case Wednesday.
Gary Repp's family declined comment.
Reach reporter Sarah Lemon at 776-4487, or e-mail slemon@mailtribune.com.
Justice took a long time to get back on track, but thanks to the fact that other Oregon State Police Officers kept the faith, like Mike Barnett, writing from freegaryrepp@hotmail.com, ultimately, the truth was revealed. Gary, a father of two and a peacekeeper, was cleared of guilt, and Kerry's place in the record-books was made secure, perhaps forever. Here's what Mike Barnet said in his post at a whiney-cop website called www.guardroom.com, dredged out of Google cache, since the whiners closed down their bitch forum:
[quote="OSP Mike Barnett“]Yes, there are many innocent people wrongly convicted of a crime every year. A very similar case is going on in Medford, Oregon right now. Gary Repp, a ”former“ State Police Officer, was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife. He was not at home at the time of the murder and there is absolutely NO evidence (physical, witnesses, otherwise) that link him to the crime. There is nothing at all, yet the police hold him in jail just because they can. His trial is set for May 2003, but it's very frightening to think that yet another innocent man could be sent to jail for life and possibly get the death penalty for a crime which the police KNOW HE DID NOT COMMIT.
It is a shame with high quality people are falsley accused by the ”law“ in order to hide misconduct within the ”law". The system is out of order and needs to be changed.
Posted by: M. Barnett (freegaryrepp@hotmail.com) on January 14, 2003 07:51 PM
Google cache link[/quote]
Yes, for a time poor Gary Repp sat in jail, and eventually had to stand trial before a jury of his peers, even though there was a suicide note, and even though his wife had sent an email her hotmail account, logging in at Gary’s office at the Medford Armory, and the email said she was depressed. Even though some of Gary’s cop friends swore there was no way he could have killed Kerry and have gotten to the ball game without a drop of blood on him as quickly as he did. He had to stand trial.
February 5, 2004
Murder trial gets under way
By SARAH LEMON
Mail Tribune
While Gary Repp Jr. spent four months away from home training to be an Oregon State Police trooper, his wife told everyone how happy she was with him gone.
While Kerry Michele Repp was going out to nightclubs and spending the couple’s money, her husband was learning how to protect and investigate crime scenes.
While Kerry was having an affair with another man, conceiving his child, Repp was planning his strayed wife’s killing, said District Attorney Mark Huddleston.
Prosecuting Repp for murder, Huddleston’s opening arguments Wednesday in Jackson County Circuit Court painted Repp, 35, as a cold-blooded killer who believed he could fool police with a staged death scene and fake suicide note.
The crime would be carried out a week before Repp’s scheduled departure to Egypt with his Army National Guard unit.
“On May 4, 2002, Gary Repp put (police) training to work, not to solve a crime but to commit one, Huddleston said.
But Repp’s defense team portrayed their client as a victim of the very brotherhood to which he belonged. Botched police work led to Repp’s arrest, said defense attorney Jeni Feinberg.
”You will probably be shocked by the quality of this investigation,“ she told jurors.
Attorneys for both sides will rely heavily on the timing of events that took place the Saturday morning when Kerry was found slain on her bed with Repp’s handgun in her right hand. A 9-1-1 call made from the Repp home at 8:23 a.m. will be key evidence for both the prosecution and defense.
The call sounds like a woman screaming accompanied by several popping sounds, Huddleston said. Dispatchers disconnected that call when they didn’t get a response on the line. In violation of police protocol, the dispatcher did not send officers to the home.
Kerry was alive when the call for help was made, but Repp and the children had already left the couple’s Hazel Street home in Central Point, Feinberg said.
After taking the two boys to a Little League baseball field where Kerry’s oldest son was to have a team photo taken, Repp went to a campground where he had planned to meet his family for the weekend.
Huddleston’s witnesses place Repp’s hurried appearance at the baseball field up to 15 minutes later than defense witnesses. The route from the Repp home to the baseball field on Hanley Road takes just 5 minutes by car, Huddleston said.
Kerry’s absence that Saturday morning worried family and friends who had made plans with her the previous day. Repp said his wife was at home ”doing the pregnant thing.“ After numerous phone calls to the Repp home went unanswered, Kerry’s father, Ron Johnson, went to check on her at around 1 p.m. that afternoon.
He found his 29-year-old daughter dead, her own blood soaking the plaid bed sheets and her light blue pajamas. She had been shot four times, in the head, chin, neck and chest.
Etched in Kerry’s blood, a nearly invisible footprint links the crime to her husband, Huddleston said. Investigators discovered the impression of a bare foot, which appears to match Repp’s, halfway under the edge of the couple’s bed.
Also found under the bed, the cordless phone used to dial 9-1-1 revealed Kerry’s blood and fragments of her teeth.
However, not a speck of blood was seen on Repp when he left the couple’s home, Feinberg said. Not a trace of blood could be found on his clothing, shoes or wedding ring when police analyzed those items, she said. Detectives looked long and hard for any effort to show that the killer cleaned up in the Repp home, but that evidence just didn’t exist, she added.
Kerry’s wedding ring was left on the kitchen counter along with a note to Repp apologizing for having hurt him. An e-mail suicide note sent at 8:15 a.m. from Kerry’s Hotmail e-mail account to her mother, JoeAnn Johnson, also was sent to Repp’s Hotmail account, Huddleston said. Although prosecutors have no direct evidence that Repp possessed the password for his wife’s e-mail account, a National Guard computer accessed both Repp’s and Kerry’s e-mail accounts the day before the murder. Details of the electronic
message have yet to be revealed, but those who knew Kerry would say she didn’t compose the message, Huddleston said.
The first witnesses to Kerry’s murder scene are expected to testify as the trial continues today in Medford.
Reach reporter Sarah Lemon at 776-4487, or e-mail slemon@mailtribune.com
You can find this story online at:
http://www.mailtribune.com/archive/2004/0205/local/stories/02local.htm
Copyright © Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved.
February 7, 2004
Testimony heats up in Repp trial
By SARAH LEMON
Mail Tribune
Even if Kerry Repp could have warned police of her murder, 9-1-1
operators most likely wouldn’t have understood her cry for help.
A shot to the back of the neck broke Repp’s jaw as she cradled
telephone the morning of her May 4, 2002, murder, police said. The wound would have rendered Repp’s speech unintelligible, said forensic pathologist James Olson. A pillow held between the gun and Repp’s head muffled the shot.
Investigators testifying Friday for prosecutors against accused murderer Gary Marvin Repp Jr. outlined the series of four gunshots
that killed Kerry Repp in the bedroom of her Central Point home. The
testimony was heard in Jackson County Circuit Court.
Presenting an illustration of Kerry Repp at the time of her murder,
prosecutors showed a woman sitting on the edge of a bed with a
cordless telephone in her left hand, a gun aimed at a downward angle
behind her head. Blood and pieces of bone and teeth were found on
the phone’s mouthpiece.
Emergency dispatchers got the call that Kerry Repp attempted to make
at 8:23 a.m., but when no one answered, the operator disconnected
the line. Officers were not sent to the house though they should
have been, according to police protocol.
The first shot to the back of Kerry Repp’s neck was followed by two
others underneath her chin and below her chin in the center of her
neck. The final gunshot to Kerry’s heart killed her, Olson said.
One of the pillows found near the bed shows rips caused by the gun’s
blast, Olson said. Forensic scientists said they caused similar
rents in another pillowcase when test-firing the murder weapon. The
evidence suggested the shooter placed a pillow between the gun and
its target, Olson said.
Using his knowledge of crime scenes, former Oregon State Police
trainee Gary Marvin Repp Jr., set up his wife’s murder to look like
a suicide, District Attorney Mark Huddleston has argued.
However, recruits who attended OSP training camp with Repp described
their study of crime scenes as basic. During the four-month session,
which concluded about three weeks before Kerry Repp’s murder,
recruits were instructed on how to scan a crime scene for suspects
and secure it for further investigation, troopers said.
An eight-hour course on latent fingerprints, particularly their
presence on guns, was given, troopers said. Prosecutors noted that
no fingerprints could be found at Kerry Repp’s murder scene. The
killer could have worn gloves, investigators said.
Prosecutors will present more evidence of fingerprints associated
with Kerry Repp’s murder as the trial continues next week in Circuit
Court. FBI officials who analyzed the May 4, 2002, 9-1-1 call also
are expected to testify.
Reach reporter Sarah Lemonat 776-4487, or e-mail
slemon@mailtribune.com
February 11, 2004
Jurors learn of couple’s history
By SARAH LEMON
Mail Tribune
While accused murderer Gary Marvin Repp Jr. told police that he wanted to save his marriage, his wife apparently had different ideas.
Prosecutors presented extensive audio and videotaped interviews between Repp and detectives during Tuesday’s continuing trial of the former Oregon State Police trooper, who is accused of killing his wife, Kerry. In the interviews, Repp gave lengthy accounts of his and his wife’s history, her alleged self-esteem issues and details of the week leading up to her death.
Repp agreed to the interviews, conducted before his arrest, and before police
told him his wife had been murdered.
Kerry Repp was found shot to death in her bedroom on May 4, 2002.
”She didn’t think she was very pretty, but she was beautiful,“ Repp said of his wife in his first interview with police.
Kerry Repp was a good wife and mother who kept the house clean, Repp said as he began to cry during the interview. Kerry worked numerous retail jobs and learned new sports with her husband, but she had confidence problems, he said.
The couple had always had their problems, Repp said, but Kerry started to
withdraw from him when she heard the family would be moving to Lakeview once he graduated from the OSP training academy. The couple also was awaiting his overseas deployment with his Oregon Army National Guard Unit. Due to leave about a week after the date of Kerry’s murder, Repp would be gone about a year.
”We had a lot of things hit us at the same time,“ Repp told detectives.
Then Kerry Repp told her husband she had become pregnant with another man’s
child.
Repp admitted that the news hurt him, but said he didn’t believe in abortion and wanted to patch up the relationship. He eventually came to be excited about the baby’s birth, he said. Kerry, he said, vowed that she wanted nothing to do with the father of her baby.
But friends and co-workers of Kerry Repp testified that she was never so happy as the week before her husband was to leave for Egypt with his National Guard unit.
”She had the biggest smile on her face. The smile actually went to her eyes,“
said friend Sheila Mapes, who worked with Kerry Repp at JC Penney.
”She was finally free.“
With the help of her father, Ron Johnson, Kerry Repp first consulted a divorce
lawyer in March 2002. The divorce papers were filed in court a month later. But Repp, who had been at the OSP training academy from December 2001 to April 2002,was never notified. Serving her husband with divorce papers at the academy might have made him angry, Kerry told her attorney, James Mueller.
”She described Mr. Repp as a very controlling individual,“ Mueller said.
Reach reporter Sarah Lemon at 776-4487, or e-mail slemon@mailtribune.com.
You can find this story online at:
http://www.mailtribune.com/archive/2004/0211/local/stories/07local.htm
Copyright © Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved.
Well, eventually a jury saw the truth, but I can’t quote a local newspaper article on the topic, because I think the verdict struck the reporter speechless, or was for some other reason absented from the newspaper’s website. Fortunately, this letter to the editor made it clear that Gary Repp was in fact acquitted:
Jury not convinced
Letters regarding the Gary Repp murder trial show many opinions, but not a lot of knowledge.
One, from White City, calls the trial a ”rush to judgment,“ yet later says adjudication took two years.
The same writer indicated his/her own feeling of reasonable doubt, yet calls the justice system (which exonerated Repp) ”criminal.“
I did not follow this trial so I won’t comment on the verdict.
But I know a jury finding of ”not guilty" is not the same as being innocent. Not guilty simply means 12 carefully-selected people were not convinced. — M. Conens, Medford
Yes, I know the author of the letter, because it’s a small town, and Matt Conens used to be a cameraman for local TV. Well his opinion is his opinion, and you can’t unring the bell. Gary Repp’s reputation is ruined. Like Gary Repp’s fellow officer Mike Barnett said, it is a shame when an unfair shadow of blame is cast over a fine person who just had the back luck to live with a suicide who just had to break all the records, and so here is the lesson. If you decide you want to try shooting yourself multiple times as a suicide stunt, you should videotape it, because otherwise you could get someone innocent in a lot of trouble, and you won’t be around to explain it. So go to the extra trouble, videotape yourself shooting yourself, and there won’t be any shadow of murder cast over your relatives, or any question about the nature of your achievement. For example, suppose you decided to empty an entire Uzi clip into your face – that might work, especially if you like jammed a stick between the trigger guard and the trigger. You might end up with thirty rounds in your mug, clearly dwarfing the achievements of past contestants like Kerry Repp. But without video evidence, who would believe it? So why skimp? You only die once, after all.
Definitely a murder, but who?
There was never any doubt this was a murder, but the wrong person was accused and tried. A lot of reference to Sarah Lemon's writing here is really irrelevant, as she did not accurately represent what was going on in this trial. I was at the trial and her accounts the following day omitted quite a bit of what was happening. Consider these key points:Timeline- It was simply impossible for Mr. Repp to have committed such a gruesome murder without any bit of blood evidence or powder burns on his person, in his truck, or anywhere- then make it to the ball game within 12 minutes.
Crime scene- There were fingerprints on the gun, but they weren't that of Mr. Repp or Mrs. Repp. The police never followed up to find out whose prints they were. The scene was gruesome, with hand prints and foot prints all around, but they were not those of Mr. Repp. Whose were they? The final gun shot, as reported by a neighbor, was about 20 minutes after the 911 call. Apparently Kerry was still alive during that time and the local police never sent a unit to investigate. The ball game had started 10-15 minutes before.
911 tape- The tape was analyzed and two voices, neither of which were Mrs. Repp, were heard in the background. One male, one female. The male voice did not match the analysis of Mr. Repp's voice.
These are just a few of many key points that were not reported by Sarah Lemon and those alone should give pause to anyone. No one ever doubted this was a murder, especially not Gary Repp. But what everyone should want to know is who was this couple and why/how could they do such a thing to anyone?
MURDER
GARY REPP MURDERED HIS WIFE!!! I HOPE HE DOES NOT COME BACK FROM HIS MISSION OVER SEAS THIS SUMMER. I FEEL SORRY FOR THE GUYS GOING OVER WITH THEM. I WOULD SUGGEST THEY SLEEP WITH ONE EYE OPEN.HE MURDERED HIS WIFE AND A BABY.
The New Idot GI Joe
GARY REPP KNOWS WHAT HE DID AND YOU CAN TELL BY THAT LITTLE PITTIFUL BABY ON THE STAND WHEN THEY SAID HE IS NOT GUILTY, YOU COULD TELL THE RELIEF HE THOUGHT HE WAS SO BUSTED..AND TO THE LIAR WHO IS RESPONSIBLE MOST OF THIS BS YOU ARE NOT A COP MR. BARNETT YOU DON'T EVEN WORK FOR THE STATE POLICE, SO MAYBE IF YOU CAN SETTLE YOUR OWN ISSUES YOU CAN FACE THE FACT THAT GARY REPP MURDERED KERRY AND HER UNBORN DAUGHTER, ABUSED AND MISTREATED HER SON AND IT IS TOO BAD THERE WERE NO PICTURES TAKEN OF THAT TERRIBLE ACTION BECAUSE KERRY WAS AFRAID OF THE AFTERMATH IF GARY FOUND OUT. THIS PERSON MUST NOT HAVE TAKEN THE TIME TO GET TO KNOW THE FAMILY THAT HE PROMISED TO RUIN, HE TOLD HER HE WOULD KILL HER, HIS PLAN WAS FOILED NO FIGER PRINTS I WONDER WHY. GARY HAS BEEN TRAINED BY THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS AND KNOWS THE INS AND OUTS OF COPS AND MILITARY, SO OF COURSE HE KNEW WHAT TO DO. TELL ME MR. BARNETT YOU HAVE ALL THE ANSWERS TO WHAT HAPPEND, TELL ME. IF KERRY WAS ALIVE WHEN GARY AND THE BOYS ARRIVED AT THE BALL FIELD THEN WHY WASN'T THE OLDEST BOY PREPARED FOR PICTURES, HIS MOHTER WOULD NEVER ALLOW THAT SHE WAS PROUD OF HER CHILDERN. I CAN TELL YOU FOR A FACT I PERSONALLY SAW KERRY THE THURSDAY BEFORE GARY KILLED HER AND I WARNED HER TO CHANGE THE LOCKS ON THE DOORS OR GET OUT UNTIL HE LEAVES ON HIS “GI JOE” MISSION AS SHE REFFERED TO. TO THIS DAY WE KNEW HIS PLAN. WE WARNED HER, AND CAME THROUGH. SO I AGREE AND SO MANY PEOPLE DO TOO...THE SOONER GARY LEAVES THE BETTER AND WE HOPE CARMA TAKES HIS HAND AND TAKE HIM STRAIGHT TO HELL!!!! AND MAYBE HE CAN SEE WHAT IT IS LIKE TO BE SHOT CLOSE RANGE BEHING THE HEAD WHILE CALLING 911. MR. BARNETT DID YOU EVEN KNOW KERRY AND GARY WHEN THEY WERE TOGETHER AS A COUPLE? IF YOU DID YOU WOULD NOT BE CARRYING ON LIKE YOU ARE. YOU TALK ABOUT HOW REPPS LIVE HAS BEEN RUINED WELL WHAT ABOUT KERRY SHE IS IN A BOX OF ASHES UNDER THE COLD WET GROUND AND A HEAD STONE. SO TELL ME ABOUT POOR GARY...WHAT ABOUT HER TWO BOYS? NEITHER ONE HAS A MOTHER OR A FATHER ANY LONGER AS THE SON OF GARY WAS ADOPTED OUT TO HIS FAMILY. HOW CONVENINT ALL THIS WAS GOING ON WHILE HE WAS IN JAIL...WHAT IS UP MR BARNETT? WAS HE PLANNING ON SPENDING THE REST OF HIS LIFE IN JAIL FOR A CRIME HE DID? I CAN TRULY SAY MR BARNETT I HOPE YOU NEVER HAVE A DAUGHTER LOST TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE. Oh by the way to be a cop you have to have good hearing maybe you should get your ears checked and listen to that tape again.Re: The New Idot GI Joe
C.Pay wrote:
SO I AGREE AND SO MANY PEOPLE DO TOO...THE SOONER GARY LEAVES THE BETTER AND WE HOPE CARMA TAKES HIS HAND AND TAKE HIM STRAIGHT TO HELL!!!! AND MAYBE HE CAN SEE WHAT IT IS LIKE TO BE SHOT CLOSE RANGE BEHING THE HEAD WHILE CALLING 911. MR. BARNETT DID YOU EVEN KNOW KERRY AND GARY WHEN THEY WERE TOGETHER AS A COUPLE? IF YOU DID YOU WOULD NOT BE CARRYING ON LIKE YOU ARE. YOU TALK ABOUT HOW REPPS LIVE HAS BEEN RUINED WELL WHAT ABOUT KERRY SHE IS IN A BOX OF ASHES UNDER THE COLD WET GROUND AND A HEAD STONE. SO TELL ME ABOUT POOR GARY...
The Other Holes in this Murder Story
The whole case supposedly rests on the assumption that it would have been impossible for Gary Repp to commit the murder and then arrive at the ball field minutes later without any blood on him. But Several questions remain unanswered, leaving Gaping Holes in the theory that Gary Repp could not have done it.1)Supposedly, according to Gary, the day before Kerry Repp was murdered, she drove from their Central Point home to the Ashland Armory because he forgot his hat. Bear in mind this unit was getting ready to depart in a few days on an overseas mission. Bear in mind that Kerry had a strained relationship with her husband, and according to her friends was glad and relieved that he was leaving the country. So, despite this,she went to the trouble to take him his hat. Then (although she herself was a civilian) she actually went into the armory where the husband she hoped would soon leave was working. And she made herself at home and sat down at a government computer and logged into her personal email account in the midst of all these soldiers getting ready to deploy overseas. Oh, but it gets better! No one seemed to think that story was out of the ordinary, but then we are supposed to believe this pregnant woman jumped up from the armory computer, got back in her car, drove back to Central Point as fast as she could, went home, rushed up the stairs and immediately logged into her email AGAIN at home without pausing for breath. (even though she had just checked her email and was neither sending or receiving anything of importance or expecting to. ) Supposedly in the time frame she could have done this, but barely, and while it seems hardly likely that anyone would behave in this manner, neither the jury nor anyone was apparently bothered by that point either. Are spouses of government employees normally allowed to go in a government office and sit down at a government computer and check their personal email? No. Do spouses of soldiers getting ready to deploy overseas normally go in an armory or military unit and sit down at a government computer and check their personal email? I sure don't think so.
2)Well then, how about this? The morning Kerry was murdered, Gary was supposedly in the house preparing for a camping trip before taking the boys over to the ball field for a team picture. Now since Kerry was clearly murdered, one fact should be obvious. She was not planning to die that morning and had no reason to be logging onto her computer at 08:10 in the morning to compose a suicide email sent to her mother's email address and also to Gary's email address, which was sent at 08:16 - 7 minutes before the fateful 911 call. However, this email according to records WAS composed and sent from her computer in the home where she died minutes later.
So, she did not kill herself and if Gary did not kill her, the person had to be in the house, sitting at Kerry's computer, composing this note while Gary was still there. And according to Gary, Kerry came down the stairs as they were leaving, yelling at them to hurry up because they would be late.
The boys never saw their mother that morning, Gary told them not to go upstairs and not to bother her because she was not feeling well. ( Hmmm - I bet she wasn't, maybe she was already dead.)
And neither Kerry nor Gary were aware that someone was in the house using her computer (if you buy the story someone other than Gary killed her). Someone whose style of writing was totally unlike Kerry's but who used peculiar word choices Gary was known to use and whose style was much like his. And someone who knew information that only Kerry or Gary should have known.
This person who authored this note was the murderer who planned to make the murder look like a suicide. But no other person who could have remotely been considered to have gone in the house and sent this email at this time ever turned up, which leaves only two people who could have done it, Kerry or Gary. But Kerry had no thought of dying that morning and was evidently totally unprepared for what took place. She made one last attempt to call for help by dialing 911 and was ignored. Therefore it seems clear that only Gary could have written this note and there is no explanation for why he should log into his wife's email account and write this if he were not also the murderer. There was no evidence that anyone else was in the house or had used the computer.
But Gary's ability to get to the ball field without any blood on him makes it a lot more believable apparently than that some other person who knew things only Kerry or Gary should know, was in the house using the computer, unnoticed by either of them; no neighbors or witnesses saw any such person either go in the house or leave it, and this phenomenal person who must have committed the murder instead of Gary (since Gary was acquitted) also managed to remove all evidence of ever having been there so as never to even be named as “a person of interest” in the investigation.
And since Gary was acquitted, the case was closed though his only claim to innocence in the whole mess was not having any blood on him when he arrived at the ball field after the murder.
No attempt has been made to find the REAL murderer because everyone knows Gary did it even though he was let go. It seems if Gary WERE innocent, even if his relationship with Kerry was strained to the point he didn't particularly care that she was dead - seems like he would be devoting some intensive effort into finding the REAL murderer just to clear his name. But it would be of course a waste of energy, he already knows who did it and he got away with it so why bother? He might only turn up more evidence to incriminate himself.
Either way, we are letting a MURDERER who killed this woman and her unborn child roam free in our community. What a wonderful justice system we have here, to let a murderer go, just because they would consider “reasonable doubt” not being able to figure out how he got the blood off in time to get to the ball field.
And why was that so hard? After all, it was a pre meditated murder, and planned to look like a suicide, and planned to occur in such close proximity to the perpetrator's public appearance in another place that appearing there without obvious blood would provide an alibi. The only thing that went wrong with the plan was she did not die on the first shot like the perpetrator evidently intended she should.
It should be noted that no police officers or investigation team were waiting at the ball field to scrutinize Gary Repp and determine if there were any evidence of blood on him or not. It seems to me he had plenty of time to get rid of it. The body was not even discovered until some 5 hours later, and it was many more hours before Gary Repp was even found and notified, much less questioned as to his whereabouts at the time Kerry died. And it was several days before it was even admitted the case had to be a homicide rather than murder and that Gary Repp was officially named a “person of interest”.
So WHY was such a big deal made about Gary Repp appearing at the ball field without any blood on him, and that determined to be the king pin of the theory that he could not have committed the murder? No one who saw him at the ball field was looking to see if he had blood on them. Why should they? When questioned about it much later they only remembered they hadn't noticed any, and since no one was looking for it, would have to be fairly obvious to be noticed at all.
Something wrong with that picture. In the first place, the exact time when Gary Repp left the house that morning was never clearly established. Neither was the exact time of his arrival at the ball field clearly established, except he was “late”. The possibility that he had plenty of time to do it was never ruled out. Why no blood? He could have worn gloves, or even something so simple as a rain poncho from the Dollar Store would have been likely to keep the blood off his clothes. Or maybe he wasn't even dressed yet. A bare footprint in blood on the carpet near the body matched Gary's but for some reason was never considered as evidence of his presence at the crime scene. All he had to do was get to the ball field 5 minutes away with no obvious blood on him. No one at the ball field would of course be thinking this man had just murdered his wife and would not be looking at him closely for such evidence. He had plenty of time to change and get rid of his clothes afterward.
Then again, maybe Gary actually committed the murder earlier, and when things did not go as planned, had managed somehow to stage the 911 call to get her blood and teeth on the phone and had previously arranged with the dispatcher to ignore the call so he could get away. There could be plenty of ways to explain how Gary got to the ball field without obvious blood on him; to me the evidence linking him to the case seems much more difficult to explain away.
Mike Barnett claims there was no evidence linking Gary to the case. May Mike Barnett then please explain Gary's story about Kerry checking her personal email on a National Guard computer the day before she was murdered and how some other unknown person got into their house unnoticed the morning of the murder,while Kerry and Gary were both there and managed to boldly sit at Kerry's computer typing a suicide note without any worry that either of them might notice and spoil the plans. And how this other person who knew Kerry and Gary well enough to know information only they would know, and could hack into Kerry's email account and in minutes reel off a suicide note complete with peculiar word choices and phraseology typical of Gary's writing,-how this person could then commit the murder minutes after Gary left the house, and then manage to completely eradicate all evidence they were ever there and escape from the house in broad daylight without being seen or noticed by anyone and be far away by the time the body was discovered and have such an ironclad alibi that they would never ever be suspected or named as a person of interest. Especially if as Mike Barnett suggests there were TWO people, a man and a woman who perpetrated this, whose voices he claims were on the tape and whose handprints and fingerprints and footprints in blood all over the room (but no evidence of them ever entering or leaving the house). If Mike Barnett truly has evidence of these other people who might have been there and done the crime, and especially if he is so anxious to clear Gary's fair name, why doesn't he bring out this evidence and do something about it?
Something should be done to solve this case before this murderer becomes uncomfortble and murders someone else.
OSP Mike Barnett
Wow anytime you would like to be really educated on this subject,I would love to get together and set you straight.Info on Kerry
Kerry's brother, do you have a website or something? I certainly would like to be educated on this subject but don't want to post my contact info here. I did not know your sister really, but could remember buying children's clothes of her at JC Penny's - she always had a big smile. She deserves to have her murderer brought to justice and I believe this could yet be done.Soldier?
Ha Ha he calls himself a soldier...how is that weekend warrior a soldier, he isn't even seeing any action he has a sit down job away from anything going on. Watch out military families he is “training” others to kill maybe you should sleep with one eye open for when your spouses come home and they have learned the perfect murder from Gary Repp.Sherlock Holmes
After all, Sherlock Holmes said we eliminate “the impossible,” before concluding that “whatever remains must be the truth.That is a portion taken from a posted statement earlier which is so true ” it is impossible to shoot yourself in the back of the head like she was shot, I am glad you are not Sherlock Holmes...
Friends in High Places
what I would like to know is how he got away with this when it seems fairly obvious to me and plenty of others.Remember Gary Repp had worked as a Jackson County parole officer in charge of men comitting domestic violence against their wives. He must have heard all kinds of stories and had plenty of opportunity to acquire creative ideas in pullng this off. Poor Kerry did not dare to try to make her escape before he left the country because she well knew he would come after her and erase the trail so justice would never be done. Gary couldn't stand it because he knew once he left the country she would be out of his control, so he made sure she would never escape. Gary knew the justice system inside out so he was able to get away with this heinous crime.... and maybe there are people there who know more about it than they are telling.
Perilous times will come
The Lord has said that District Attorney Mark Huddleson is a man of corrupt mind. Which may account for why Huddleson intentionally lost one of the most high profile murder cases in southern Oregon history so far, as the case involved the murder of the wife of a man who had previously been a southern Oregon probation and parole officer and Oregon State Patrol Officer.Rather than stand up for truth and justice, the prosecution's losing the case was accomplished in a number of ways, to include Huddleson showing up to court sitting in a wheelchair in order to give the jury an official sign of weakness and concession. He said he had been injured doing yard work and thus needed to go to court sitting in a wheelchair. He could have been on his feet or on crutches.
Thousands of people in Medford, Oregon groaned, when they felt that a jury that had been so clearly instructed by the DA Mark Huddleson with his wicked wheelchair antic, let who they think is the murderer of Kerry Repp walk free. Gary Repp had been kept in jail just under two years awaiting his trial, that the DA then deliberately lost. Many feel that less than two years in jail is insufficient punishment for the crime of first degree murder. The DA thinks it was.
Since the trial ended in 2004, Medford, Oregon has experienced an unprecedented jump in crime rates. That is probably due to the wickedness of men like the murderer and Huddleson who the people and voters
there allow to continue in positions of authority to thus continue to do evil and resist truth. For according to Solomon, the people will groan as long as the wicked are in authority.
Re: Perilous times will come
Perilous wrote:
Which may account for why Huddleson intentionally lost one of the most high profile murder cases in southern Oregon history so far, as the case involved the murder of the wife of a man who had previously been a southern Oregon probation and parole officer and Oregon State Patrol Officer.
Trial incompetence may not rise to the level of intentionally losing, but it is understood among local lawyers that Mark Huddleston is not the toughest guy to try a case against. Mark is a canny and capable administrator who usually keeps himself out of trials. Judy Lowry or Angie Lanier or even Doug McGeary would probably all have gotten convictions, but at the time I don't think any of them were available. I suspect Mark was unable to enlist any Deputy DA to pursue the case, because it was such a hot potato, and actually went forward with the best of intentions, but without great passion. I know Mark feels for victims, but by nature he has a calm temperament, and doesn't want to light the emotional fuse that powers a great criminal trial. Please do not view this as an endorsement of Mr. Huddleston, but just as another data point for readers.
:) Chas