Steve Fishman, Narrator
Appearances
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
This is Mark Davis. Mark was born and raised on the outskirts of Mansfield, in a big family where there was always room at the dinner table. Soon after he met Jack, he learned about the doctor's chronic malnutrition and offered to help.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
When he first met Jack, Mark was a mechanotherapist, a kind of physical therapist. He and Jack had offices near each other, which was how they crossed paths.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Mark, who enjoyed model planes, was impressed. Soon, Jack was a regular at the Davis dinner table. Most of Mark's extended family lived nearby, and a bunch would regularly show up for dinner.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
So Jack was like part of the family. Yeah. Mark liked Jack, and he was kind of flattered that the prominent doctor took to him too. Despite their different backgrounds, their friendship was easy. They'd prank each other, needle each other, like when Jack tried to ride Mark's bulldozer.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
To Mark, Jack seemed great, rich but not snobby, educated but not pretentious, at home in the country and always up for a good conversation and a good meal. So Mark got to thinking.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Mark Davis' niece, Sherry Campbell. The fun 28-year-old who was supposed to be terminally ill. The patient. Collier met that day at the country party.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
It was a stunner. The first time Collier heard it, he and his parents were in the dining room of an exclusive country club, hosting a party for his father's medical colleagues. Collier was eight years old, crayons in hand.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Collier had no idea what was going on between his father and Sherry. For all he knew, she was his patient. But he had begun to realize that all was not well between his parents.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
What Caillou did know was that the arguments could get heated and that sometimes his father could get real angry.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Despite his father's temper, Caillou treasured their time together. He was an 11-year-old boy. He wanted to be around his dad, wanted to impress him, to earn his praise. And so on Father's Day 1989, a few weeks after that party in the country, Collier happily accompanied Jack on another father-son trip, this one to his office to pick up some paperwork.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
On the way home, Jack wanted to make a little detour.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
So let's get back to January 1990, six months after Collier saw his father kiss Sherry. Collier's mother has just disappeared, and he's reporting to Lieutenant Dave Messmore regularly with clues. The kissing, the ring, all of it. Dave doesn't exactly jump up and down with excitement.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
He's writing it down in his little book. Dave doesn't say much because Dave didn't have much. He hadn't been able to find Noreen, and Dr. Jack Boyle still wouldn't talk to him. So with little else to go on, Dave decided to dig into the good doctor a little bit more. He started hearing stories, lots of them.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
In fact, Jack came from a modest family. His dad was a firefighter, and Jack didn't grow up with privilege. He'd gone to medical school on a scholarship and also had a part-time job. By that point in Dave's investigation, he'd started interviewing nurses.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Dave was a family man. Family meant a lot to him. And this philandering thing, it offended him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
As if that wasn't enough, the woman said Jack had left something disturbing for her. It was a photograph of himself dressed in his former white Navy uniform, dozens of medals pinned to his chest, standing with his arm around a much younger woman.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
And what about Collier's favorite story, the one about Dr. Jack Boyle's heroism on the high seas during the Vietnam War?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Of course, when his mother first disappeared, Collier didn't know most of this. What he did know was that his mother was gone, his father was involved with another woman, and something felt very, very wrong. And then, according to Collier, on January 1st, just one day after Noreen went missing, the Boyle household got a visitor.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Later, Collier found out that his father had had many girlfriends. Many, many, many, many. Still, his family had worked in its way. But Sherry was different. She's the one who got pregnant. Don't want to wait for that next episode? You don't have to. Unlock all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to the Binge Podcast channel.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Search for The Binge on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page. Not on Apple? Head to getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. As a subscriber, you'll get binge access to new stories on the first of every month. Check out the Binge channel page on Apple Podcasts or getthebinge.com to learn more. Finding Mom's Killer is a production of Orbit Media.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Creator and host, Steve Fishman. That's me. Our senior producer is Drew Nellis. Our producer and production coordinator, Austin Smith. Our story editor, Emile Klein. Fact check by Ryan Alderman. Mixing and sound design by Scott Somerville. Our lawyers are at Davis Wright Tremaine. From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producer is Jonathan Hirsch.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Special thanks to Emily Rasek, Steve Ackerman, Catherine St. Louis, Sammy Allison, Fisher Stevens, Ria Julian, Dan Bobcoff. At WME, we'd like to thank Evan Krasick, Marissa Hurwitz, and Ben Davis. We want to also thank Carl Hunnell at the Richland Source for the generous use of his podcast studio.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Collier's mother has no doubt heard this story many times before, but Collier hasn't, and he's captivated.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode 2, The Stories We Tell.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
It's January 1990 in Mansfield, Ohio. Collier Landry Boyle is 11. It's been a few years since he's heard his father tell that story of wartime derring-do. A lot has changed. Collier's mother, Noreen, has just disappeared. His father, Jack, is in tears, telling friends that Noreen has walked out on the family, though he doesn't seem particularly interested in helping the police find her.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Collier, on the other hand, is in a panic. He's established a partnership of sorts with veteran police lieutenant Dave Messmore.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
For Lieutenant Messmore, this wasn't just lip service. He was becoming fond of this odd, overly polite kid. Without his mother, Collier seemed all alone in the world, like he needed a parent. Did you feel like Collier was interested in making a relationship with you?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Right then, Collier needed someone to confide in. The story he'd been telling himself about his childhood had just been rewritten. And in Collier's memory, that childhood was idyllic. When he was growing up, his father was a Navy physician and the Boyles lived on a base in Virginia. A Navy base isn't fancy, but for Collier, it was a place of wonder.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Planes landed so close it felt like they were right next door. He spent hours digging up old military relics in the backyard. And his parents, Jack and Noreen, doted on him. They made a home in which a little boy could forget himself completely, even when his imagination got the better of him. Like one day when he was watching a favorite cartoon.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
If Collier thought of his father as a hero, then his mother was his soulmate.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Noreen took Collier everywhere. From an early age, he'd join her for lunch dates with friends. He was her escort for plays and art openings, her style consultant when she picked out designer clothes or home decor or fancy jewelry.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
The Binge. Feed your true crime obsession. We all remember the stories our parents told us. Not just the bedtime stories, but the ones our parents told about themselves. The stories that summed up who they were, their place in the world, and the lives we, their children, might someday lead. As a kid, Collier Landry Boyle heard lots of these stories. There was one his dad especially liked to tell.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Clearly, Collier wasn't a scrappy little kid coming home with mud on his jeans. Noreen didn't even like him wearing jeans. She dressed him in slacks and polo shirts. She cooked him gourmet meals. He loved her cooking. And she made sure his manners were perfect.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
After all, as Noreen reminded Collier, they came from good stock, money, and glamour.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
It wasn't just Noreen's side of the family. Collier's father, Jack, said that his ancestors were prominent bluebloods from Philadelphia's famous main line, which made Jack and Noreen a good match, both descendants of American Brahmins. They certainly looked the part. Jack was tall and handsome, with a mop of dark curly hair. Noreen was petite, blonde, beautiful.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
And Collier, he was their perfect, precocious son, eager to entertain his parents.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
For people from a distinguished lineage, a no-frills Navy base was hardly the place to reassert their ancestral glory. Clearly, the Boyles were meant for finer things. So when they got the chance to leave, they jumped at it. In 1983, they moved to Mansfield, Ohio. Now Mansfield, population 50,000, might not have been a hive of culture, but it was a step up.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Jack and Noreen had decided it was time for private practice and a larger payday. The Boyles bought a modest house in a posh neighborhood. They put Collier in private school. And eventually they expanded their family, adopting a little girl from China. Jack's practice took off. Patients liked him and sent their friends. It was a family business. Jack doctored, Noreen kept the books.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Soon the Boyles amassed symbols of success. Three cars, including a BMW and a Range Rover. Noreen started collecting Louis Vuitton purses. Eventually, she'd own seven. Jack had a reputation as a devoted and hardworking physician. He even did house calls like an old-fashioned country doctor. And tagging along was one of Collier's favorite father-son activities.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
And so in the summer of 1989, Kaya didn't think much of it when his father invited him to come along on an appointment way out in the country.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Eventually, Jack introduced Collier to his patient, a woman named Sherry. She was 28, a mother of two, and lived just down the road.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Collier jumped on behind Sherry and they drove off. Collier was a long way from trying on Rolexes at Tiffany's, but he was having a great time. This Sherry lady, he thought, she's fun. Eventually, Collier headed off with Sherry's kids. They ran around the woods and skipped some stones on a nearby lake. Then Collier realized he hadn't seen his dad for quite some time.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Collier felt bad for Sherry, but he'd done plenty of house calls with his father. He'd seen his father attend to plenty of sick patients. Actually, it sometimes felt like his dad was always out seeing sick patients.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
To Collier, it seemed like his dad was never home. In fact, Collier and his mother rarely saw him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 2. The Stories We Tell
Around Mansfield, there were a few different stories told about Dr. Jack Boyle, the well-heeled husband, the selfless country doctor, the courageous Navy pilot. And also, as some knew, a guy who loved a home-cooked meal, though most of the time he had to fend for himself around the Boyle residence.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Jack missed the whole thing. He'd left early that morning. That night, camping out at his principal's home with his little sister, Collier had the worst asthma attack of his life and was brought to the hospital. Out of his house, away from his father, his breath recovered. He was in stable condition. The next morning, his principal, now his guardian, came into the hospital room.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
She had news for him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
By mid-January 1990, Noreen Boyle had been missing for about two weeks. And her 11-year-old son, Collier, was desperately trying to find her.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
This is Mike Dugan, a detective in a suburb of Erie called Mill Creek Township. As it turned out, the house on Wolf Road was located in Mill Creek, which has its own police department. That's how Detective Dugan got involved.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Because of Dave's intervention, Collier was now out of harm's way. On January 25th, Children's Services had taken him away from Jack. That same day, Lieutenant Dave Messmore and the Mansfield Police made another big move. They executed a search warrant on the Boyle household. The police made a big show of it. Lots of equipment, lots of manpower. But they found nothing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
No physical evidence, no blood, no indications of a struggle. Nothing in the Boyle's three cars. In short, no evidence of murder. But Dave was not discouraged. He wasn't the type to let go. Which is why he had put a backup plan in motion. Here's Detective Mike Dugan again.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Just as police were coming up empty at the Boyle residence in Mansfield, police in Mill Creek Township, 180 miles away, were seeking a court order to search the house on Wolf Road. It wasn't clear they'd get it. As even Dave admits, that search warrant relied on some questionable leaps in logic and pretty thin evidence. After all, what was the evidence that there even was a body?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
or that the body was in the Erie house.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
That's about the time that the Erie detective heard once again from the realtor who'd sold Jack the house. Remember, she'd said there was one more strange thing about Jack, but at the time she couldn't quite recall it. Well, she'd remembered it.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The realtor's new information went into the application for the search warrant.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
There you go. Dave's supposedly flimsy application had been signed by a judge. Dave now had what he most wanted, a chance to search the house on Wolf Road. David fixated on that house, a fixation that his superiors did not share.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
According to Lieutenant Messmore, his superiors were pretty much convinced that go-it-alone Dave had gotten hooked on a wayward theory. And now, based on that theory, was going to go tear up the house of a prominent local physician.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Maybe Dave Superiors had a point. Maybe he was too close to this one. For Dave, this wasn't just another case. This was personal. He was offended by Dr. Jack Boyle.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
On the morning of January 25th, the search of the Boyle residence in Mansfield produced nothing. So Lieutenant Dave Messmore and a local prosecutor climbed into Dave's department-issued Oldsmobile and made the long drive to Erie. In Dave's recollection, it was a rough trip.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
What should have been a three-hour drive turned into a five-hour slog. And for what? Let's be real. A doctor with no history of violent crime is going to murder his wife, a premeditated murder, in their home with his mother and children sleeping nearby. Oh, and this mastermind is going to rent a jackhammer to dig his wife's grave using a personal check with his name on it?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
It's a little far-fetched, this whole thing. That doesn't seem to you like you're on a wild goose chase?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
For Dave, this case was different from any other he'd worked on.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
And Dave believed God was leading him to Wolf Road.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
When Dave arrived at Wolf Road, it was dark, already past five, and the temperature was in the low 20s. He met a team of local technicians and cops, including Detective Mike Dugan.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The Erie cops had canvassed local hardware stores and discovered that Jack had purchased a large roll of indoor-outdoor carpeting, what you might know as AstroTurf.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
This was not good news. Dave had half a dozen men traipsing around this big, empty house. Turned out, Jack and Sherry had not moved in, despite the rush to collect the keys. There was no furniture, though Dave did notice a working phone. They'd struck out in the garage, and according to Dave, some of the cops were getting antsy.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Dave led the other cops from the garage into the house toward the only other room where a jackhammer might be used, the basement.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The cops knocked the shelving down with sledgehammers, having a good time destroying what Jack and Sherry had imagined as the children's playroom.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
What do these photos mean? Collier calls up Mansfield Police Lieutenant Dave Messmore, his partner in the hunt for his mother. And what does he say when you tell him about the photos?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
There was something else the cops had discovered when they were canvassing the local hardware stores. In addition to finding out about Jack's purchase of the indoor-outdoor carpeting, they learned he'd bought several bags of quick-drying concrete. Now, even quick-drying concrete can take up to a month to fully cure or harden.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
And as the cops discovered, in the basement of the Wolf Road house, under the shelving and the indoor-outdoor carpeting, there was a section of the floor that hadn't completely cured.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The uncured concrete was about three inches thick. The team broke that up and hit dirt. And then something caught Dave's eye.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Something Collier had mentioned seeing around the Boyle house recently.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Hours passed. It was getting late.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
And there was a woman's body.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
On her neck, there were two chains. She also had a wristwatch on, a Rolex.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
When the technicians cut the bag open, blonde hair tumbled out. It looked like the hair in a photo Dave had brought with him. A photo of Noreen.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
After taking one last look at the body in the basement, Lieutenant Dave Messmore walked upstairs with one thought on his mind.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
So Dave picked up Dr. Jack Boyle's house phone. He woke up his captain back in Mansfield, the same captain who, according to Dave, told him he was about to embarrass the department.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
In the early morning hours of January 26th, a phalanx of Mansfield police headed to the Boyle house and knocked on the door.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode 3, The House on Wolf Road. The thing about active cases is that there are unpredictable turns. This one was no exception. Lieutenant Dave Messmore's investigation was about to relocate.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Dave was exhausted. So was the prosecutor he'd brought along. Still, they took a moment to celebrate. They headed to the nearest cheap motel. In their room, they drank beer, ate pizza. And Dave, in his glory, surveyed their surroundings.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The next day, Dave began the long drive back home to Mansfield. Noreen had been found. Jack had been locked up. That evening, Dave phoned the house where the Boyle children had been taken into care.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
At the home of Collier's foster family, Dave and Collier went into a small TV room, just the two of them. Dave sat on a chair facing Collier on a couch. Their knees were a few inches apart.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
She was either the black widow or in bad luck. I don't know which.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Collier was, in effect, an orphan. I'm all alone.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
And it wasn't over yet. Before he left the Guardian's house that evening, Lieutenant Dave Mismore had a request for Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
In the trial of Dr. Jack Boyle for the murder of Noreen Boyle, their son Collier was to be the prosecution's star witness. And there would be a trial because Dr. Jack Boyle, despite the body found in his basement, pleaded not guilty.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
What was Jack's defense? He was the innocent victim of a conspiracy to set him up. Unlock all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to the Binge Podcast channel. Not only will you immediately unlock all episodes of this show, but you'll get binge access to an entire network of other great true crime and investigative podcasts. All ad-free.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Plus, on the first of every month, subscribers get a binge drop of a brand new series. That's all episodes, all at once. Search for The Binge on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page. Not on Apple? Head to getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. Finding Mom's Killer is a production of Orbit Media. Creator and host, Steve Fishman. That's me.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Our senior producer is Drew Nellis. Our producer and production coordinator, Austin Smith. Our story editor, Emile Klein. Fact check by Ryan Alderman. Mixing and sound design by Scott Somerville. Our lawyers are at Davis Wright Tremaine. From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producer is Jonathan Hirsch. Special thanks to Emily Rasek, Steve Ackerman, Catherine St.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Almost as soon as he began looking into the disappearance of Noreen Boyle, Dave learned that her husband was planning a disappearing act of his own. Dr. Jack Boyle was leaving town.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Dr. Jack Boyle had made no secret of the move. A month earlier, he'd placed an ad in the local paper informing patients that he was shutting down his practice.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
It didn't take long for the Erie detective to learn about Jack. He seemed to be setting up a new life in Erie. And he'd have the means to do it. At his new job, he stood to make a lot of money, about $500,000 a year, which would be worth over a million dollars today. The detective learned that Jack had already bought a house in Erie, one a lot bigger than the Boyle house in Mansfield.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
He's partly decomposed.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
3,000 square feet, four bedrooms, a two and a half car garage, a new fireplace, and a huge unfinished basement. It was on a street called Wolf Road.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
For instance, there was Jack's companion when looking at houses. Here's the realtor describing that companion.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
sherry as in sherry campbell was pregnant with jack's child but she wasn't his wife not yet now introducing your much younger extremely pregnant girlfriend as your wife is hardly illegal and it's a lot less complicated to explain to a stranger but the situation did get complicated there was something else the detective learned from the realtor It wasn't just Jack's house.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
It was apparently Jack and Sherry's house. The contract of sale for the Wolf Road house was signed by two people, Jack Boyle and someone calling herself N. Sherry Boyle. N. Sherry Boyle was, of course, Jack's girlfriend.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Turned out it was useful for Jack to have his quote-unquote wife with him to sign papers. Because of the divorce proceedings, Jack's finances were tied up with Noreen's. To get a mortgage, Jack had to get his wife's approval. And apparently, his wife did give her approval. The new wife, Mrs. N. Sherry Boyle. She forged her name. It was like Sherry was erasing Noreen.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Now, as for Sherry's forgery, maybe all this was just a naive, lovestruck young woman doing whatever her older, wealthier lover asked. Dave wasn't so sure. He wondered, was Sherry involved in Noreen's disappearance? Don't tell me she didn't know what was going on. Dave soon learned something else he found suspicious.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Jack paid the house's full asking price, nearly $300,000, without negotiating, except for one condition. He wanted to move in two weeks early, before the end of the year. Jack said he was starting work in Erie in early January. The seller agreed and Jack picked up the keys to the Wolf Road house at noon on December 30th. Noreen disappeared 15 hours later. Hmm.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
To Dave, the time was starting to seem meticulously planned. But to what end? Then, according to the eerie detective, the realtor made a strange comment. Here's what the detective recalls.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Remember those photos junior detective Collier Landry Boyle told Lieutenant Messmore he discovered in his father's truck? The unfamiliar house, Sherry Campbell and her children standing in front of a new fireplace? That was the Erie house, the one on Wolf Road. Dave's investigation had already led him to the new house, but he thanked Collier, praised his efforts. Dave had grown fond of Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
He felt terrible for him. And the photos did help sharpen Dave's understanding. Kaya was being supplanted. So was Noreen. Sherry and her kids, they were Jack's family now.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Dave figured if Jack was hoping to make a fresh start in Erie with a new wife and a new house, then Noreen must have been in the way. Dave was now convinced the Erie house was a key to Noreen's disappearance.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Listen to all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge, feed your true crime obsession.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Collier constantly had more tidbits to report to Dave. He'd call Dave a couple times a week. Any reason to reach out was a good one.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
So Collier kept sharing intel with Dave about his father's movements. And Jack was constantly on the move. By this point, December 1989 into January 1990, Jack was leading a kind of double life. He wasn't just going back and forth between Mansfield and Erie to relocate his office, a three-hour drive each way. He was staying at Sherry's place most nights, then getting up at 5 a.m.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
and hurrying back to the Boyle family residence where, most mornings, Collier found him sleeping on the couch in the living room. Apparently, Jack was intent on keeping up appearances. But according to Collier, in other ways, he let his appearance slip.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
And then a tip came into the Mansfield Police Department. This tip changed everything for Dave. An anonymous woman called. She said she worked for a friend of Jack's and she'd rented a piece of machinery for Dr. Boyle, a jackhammer. Had Dr. Boyle taken up manual labor after all? So you find out that he rented a jackhammer. What's your reaction then?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
The cops visited Easy Rental in Mansfield. According to the store manager, the man who rented the jackhammer was definitely Jack. He paid for it with a personal check, given his driver's license's ID. He picked up the jackhammer on December 29th. Noreen went missing in the early hours of December 31st. To Dave, the way those dates fit together sure seemed suspicious.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Noreen disappears, and Dr. Boyle just happens to have a jackhammer handy. Hmm.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Keep in mind, Noreen is still just a missing person. There's no body, which means there's no murder. But what if Dave finds Noreen's body buried beneath the Wolf Road house? Well, that would change everything. But now Dave is worried. If Dr. Jack Boyle is a murderer, well, then Collier is living under a murderer's roof. And then Jack makes a proposal to Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
Father and son had taken trips to Florida before, but this one felt different. Collier was afraid.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 3. The House on Wolf Road
By now, Dave is convinced that Jack's capable of anything, including killing his own son. A few days later, on January 25th, Collier awoke to some surprise visitors.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Listen to all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge, feed your true crime obsession. The Binge.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
At one point, Jackson's Collier a video. It's shot in the prison against a painted background. Sky, mountains, a red race car. It's like a prisoner's dream. Jack is in his blue prison uniform, gray-haired and wearing glasses.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The video is awkward. It's as if Jack doesn't have much to say.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
But there's one moment in the video that's strikingly different in tone. It's like Jack is speaking in code.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
What is this project? Jack has something specific in mind. Nearly as soon as he'd arrived in prison, Jack started filing appeals. He insisted on his innocence, casting himself as the victim of a vast conspiracy. I will continue to fight to be free of this illegal conviction, he wrote. And you know what would really help in that fight?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
if Collier, the person who knows him best, the prosecution's star witness, would change his story. If he would say he'd lied on the stand. In one of his many letters to Collier, Jack makes this request. The letters between Jack and Collier are much more powerful if you can hear them. So we got some AI software to recreate the voices of Collier and Jack. Here they are reading their actual letters.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
I am innocent. So Jack has an angle. He wants Collier to help him go free. And while Collier's correspondence may have started simple, just a desire to connect, his own intentions seem to shift. Collier writes to Jack much less often. And even when he does, there's a lot of teenage boy stuff. Sports, grades, girls.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
In March 1991, nine months after his father's conviction, Collier pens a one-page letter in the labored script of a fledgling cursive writer. He's 13. There's some preamble.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
For the past six months, Collier had been living with his foster parents, but most weekends, he headed over to Lieutenant Dave Messmore's house.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Then Collier's tone changes. He's direct. You can hear his emotion, his confusion.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Now that is an incredibly generous letter. You can feel that Collier is torn up inside. He knows his father's a killer. but he offers his father love, says he's proud to be a Boyle. A convicted murderer might consider himself lucky to receive such grace. But Jack, in his subsequent letters, guess who he blames for his conviction? Guess who he accuses of being the real liar?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Jack keeps proclaiming his innocence, keeps demanding Collier recant his testimony. Later, when Collier makes it clear that he will not do that, Jack seems to become an entirely different person. In November 1992, he writes Collier an eight-page, single-spaced, typewritten letter. Frankly, it's difficult to read this letter. It's menacing, vicious, and personal.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Keep in mind, this is a father writing to his 14-year-old son, a kid who, despite everything, has just offered Jack a loving relationship.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
This is a furious letter. It's also a weird letter. Jack's prose is so different, so supercilious. Who is this person?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
If this letter weren't so ugly, there'd be something funny about it. Is Jack trying to channel Shakespeare, the Bible? As he continues, Jack claims that his only mistake in life was treating Collier too well.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
As you know by now, Dave isn't really a hard-on-the-sleeve kind of guy, but he liked having Collier around.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
No X's and O's at the end of this letter, just his prisoner number. Collier takes a couple of months to write back. In the meantime, Jack has returned all of Collier's letters, including this next one, unopened. Too bad. It's reasoned, kind. It's almost too forgiving. In January 1993, Collier writes...
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So 14-year-old Collier is in the middle of it. His emotions pull him one way and then the other. Mommy will knock on the door. Daddy didn't do it. Some part of lonely, guileless Collier still wants to believe in his father, wants to believe that the pieces can be put back together. And then one day, Collier's hopes seem like more than just hopes.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
This is Tom Adgate. Back in the 90s, he was an attorney in Akron, Ohio. Or, as he puts it...
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
In July 1994, Tom was skimming his hometown paper, the Akron Beacon Journal, when he stumbled upon an interesting article. The newspaper, one of the most respected in Ohio, was running a four-part investigative series questioning the conviction of Dr. Jack Boyle for the murder of his wife. The headline that day read, Noreen Boyle is dead, isn't she?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The article posed an explosive question. Was the body buried in the basement of that house in Erie, Pennsylvania, really Noreen Boyle's? There were, in fact, a lot of problems with the initial autopsy. We have a copy of the report. It said the dead woman had brown eyes, but Noreen's were sparkling blue, just like Collier's. The autopsy also recorded the body as heavier than Noreen was and shorter.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
But what Tom really latched onto was what was missing. The autopsy had not found a gallbladder, but Noreen did have a gallbladder.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Jack still proclaimed his innocence, and Tom didn't press him. He represented a lot of murders. He knew the game.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
But I said, well, it could be true. Tom Adgate is an odd character in this tragedy. The court jester playing it for comedy. Thanks to the media frenzy around the trial, the Boyle case was already a circus. Always room for one more clown, right? Still, in order to prove that the body was or wasn't Noreen's, the body had to be exhumed.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
And that couldn't happen without approval from Noreen's next of kin, her then 16-year-old son, Collier. For Collier, there wasn't much comedy in the situation.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
That's Sue Messmore, Dave's wife.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So Coyier signed off on the exhumation. The body was interred in Baltimore, where Noreen's sister lived. Soon enough, Tom Adgate and a crew of lawyers, cops, technicians, and reporters were convoying east.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The pathologist got to work, and it quickly turned out that the body did have a gallbladder. So much for that. Even so, the DNA was shipped off for testing. In the four years since the trial, DNA technology had improved. Now these tests could definitively prove a body's identity.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So that was that. Noreen was dead. Jack's conviction stood. Collier was an orphan. Tom Adgate's legal arc was over. Nothing had changed, including Jack's intentions. He was still determined to get out of prison, no matter how long it took. And he was still desperate for help from the person he saw as the key to his freedom, his son.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Yes, that's Dr. Jack Boyle, still in prison and still hoping to get out. And later this year, he just might. This August, at age 82, after 35 years in prison, Jack expects to go before the parole board. Maybe that's why he recently gave me a call. Jack? Over the course of many conversations, Jack has had a lot to say, including about what really happened the night of Noreen's death.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Collier bonded with Sue as well over his favorite mother-son activity.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Finding Mom's Killer is a production of Orbit Media. Creator and host, Steve Fishman. That's me. Our senior producer is Drew Nellis. Our producer and production coordinator, Austin Smith. Our story editor, Emile Klein. Fact check by Ryan Alderman. Mixing and sound design by Scott Somerville. Our lawyers are at Davis Wright Tremaine.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producer is Jonathan Hirsch. Special thanks to Emily Rasek, Steve Ackerman, Catherine St. Louis, Sammy Allison, Fisher Stevens, Ria Julian, Dan Bobcoff. At WME, we'd like to thank Evan Krasick, Marissa Hurwitz, and Ben Davis.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
We want to also thank Eleven Labs for their genius with AI and Karl Hunnell at the Richland Source for the generous use of his podcast studio. And a really warm thank you to Collier Landry for sharing his story and for his production assistance.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Sue thought it was too expensive. Dave wouldn't be happy when he saw the price tag. But Collier had a different view.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
When they got home, Sue joked that she was going to hide the day's purchase from Dave.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
There was another reason Collier was drawn to the Messmores.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Not long after the trial ended, Collier was in the car with Dave and Sue. One of their weekends together, he stuck his head between the front seats.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
What were your hesitations?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So the Mesmores filed for adoption, and it was in the hands of a judge. A few weeks later, Dave and Sue were driving through Texas, visiting one of their kids. Dave stopped to make a call to his adoption attorney, who said the judge had made a decision.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Sue couldn't comfort Collier. He was back in Mansfield in a courtroom, standing next to his state-appointed lawyer. He cried too.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
In the summer of 1990, with his mother, Noreen, dead, and his father, Jack, in prison, there was only one thing on 12-year-old Collier Landry Boyle's mind. What will happen to me? Family courts like to place children with relatives, and Collier's uncle, his father's brother, was willing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So who wanted Collier now?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode 5, Lost Boy.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
This is George Ziegler. He was a wealthy businessman in Mansfield, now retired. And as he himself admits, he's a gruff, blunt guy, not too generous with praise.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Ever since the awful events of December 31st, 1989, it seemed like Collier had been steadily losing his family, one member at a time. First his mother, then his father, then his uncle, his aunt, his foster family, his little sister, and then finally the Messmores, who'd been his hope for a normal, loving home. Enter George and Susan Ziegler. The Zieglers had been married for over 20 years.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Like almost everyone else in Mansfield, they'd been engrossed in the Boyle trial.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The Zieglers knew the Boyles a little. Their son went to the same private school as Collier. George and Noreen both sat on the school board.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Not that it put George off Collier. George liked Collier, even if he was a rather unique kid.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The Zieglers had never considered adoption, but they didn't want Collier to wind up in some random household in a strange new city.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So the Zieglers applied to adopt Collier, and to their surprise, they were successful. Or successful with the courts. One party wasn't convinced. As soon as Collier walked into the Ziegler's home, he made them a proposition.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
But the judge wasn't for it, saying, it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why Collier wouldn't be placed with the brother of the man who murdered his mother. There was his mom's sister, but she didn't want Collier. He reminded her of Jack and of everything that had happened. What about the foster parents who'd been looking after Collier?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The Ziegler's wanted the best for Collier, but after spending his whole young life as the apple of his mother's eye, Collier found he had some adjustments to make.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
When Collier cried, he did it alone in his bedroom. The Mesmores were feeling the separation as well. Here's Sue.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
So the Mesmores asked the Zieglers to meet them. One night, they went to dinner at a restaurant.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The Zieglers felt Collier needed to integrate into their family. And the Mesmores might unintentionally get in the way. The Zieglers were already encountering challenges.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Collier had all the problems of a normal teenager, but with higher stakes. The Zieglers didn't always appreciate his rich imagination. Did Collier always tell the truth? No.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
The Zieglers did the best they could for Collier. They took him in, nurtured him, protected him, loved him in their own way. They were generous. They bought him a new car for his 16th birthday. But Collier was an unusual kid who'd gone through something unimaginable. He still felt alone, rejected, a lost boy. The Zieglers couldn't understand what he'd been through. Who would?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Well, there was one person who just might. And so Kalia reached out.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
They did adopt, but only wanted his little sister, not him. Collier felt abandoned. Except for one person.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Imagine, a son reaches out to his father, the father convicted of murdering his mother. Just months after the trial ended, Collier did just that, writing to his father in prison. They'd go on to exchange hundreds of messages. We have copies of most of them, and they're a treasure trove of insights. They're heartbreaking, disturbing, sometimes almost unbearable.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
In the early letters, Jack seems desperate for a relationship with Collier. He's careful, encouraging, full of praise. He calls Collier by his childhood nickname, Bumper, and signs off, I love you and miss you, XXXOO. He even sends presents on Collier's birthday, like a jewelry box he made out of popsicle sticks. Jack writes often. Collier responds less often.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 5. Lost Boy
Maybe it's the tenor of Jack's letters. He gives Collier fatherly advice, but it's generic and stern. At one point, he writes, as I have repeated over and over to you, your education is the number one in your life. Elsewhere, he writes, don't procrastinate. It's a bad habit. It's like Jack doesn't know anything about Collier. He could be writing to anyone's kid.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
But wait, there's a development.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
This is Collier's fight. He wants justice for his mom.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier Landry Boyle, being his mother's son, carefully chose his outfit for court.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier Boyle has suspected his father since the night his mother disappeared. Now, it's all going to be settled in court. And Collier is determined to put his father away for murder. The question everyone is asking, will his father fight back?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
So in the trial's third week, sporting that white Mickey Mouse turtleneck under a blue sweater, Collier walks into a courtroom filled to capacity. He walks past the judge and past his father.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Right away, a very different version of Mad Dog Mayer is on display. The lap dog version.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
For Collier, this is the first time in six months that he's been in the same room as his father.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Inside, Coyier might be angry, but on the outside, he's not showing it. He's engaging, polite. He calls Mayor, sir. He's a little nervous, but at times it seems he's almost having fun. Like when he's asked, did he see a jackhammer around the house?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Then Mad Dog notices something. Collier has his asthma inhaler with him. It's in his hand.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier might speak like an adult, but Mad Dog has just made the point. He's a vulnerable kid. And emphasizing that makes everything he's about to say about his father much more powerful. Mayor now directs Collier to the night his mother disappeared, December 31st, 1989. He was an ear witness. First, there was a scream. That was his little sister. She slept in Noreen's room.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier believed the commotion was coming from his mother's bedroom, across the hall from his own. He couldn't say what the thuds were, but it sounded like something bad was going on.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Jurors might have thought they knew all about Dr. Jack Boyle's peccadilloes, his infidelities, his tall tales. But Collier says he's much worse than you think. The little boy who sometimes has trouble breathing is about to deliver his father a devastating blow.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier recounts other incidents, too, involving Noreen. Collier says he wanted to protect his mother, but couldn't.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode 4, The Trial of the Century.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Collier says Jack's anger was often directed towards his mom.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Mayer finishes with Collier after about an hour. He has to like what he's heard. Collier offered more circumstantial evidence that something terrible happened the night of Noreen's disappearance. But the real victory for Mayer is this. Collier testified to the side of Jack his adoring patients never saw, a sadist who terrorized his wife and son.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Here's Carl Hunnell, a reporter who covered the trial.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Now it's the defense's turn to cross-examine Collier. But this is going to be tricky. If a trial is a fight, then cross-examination is the counterattack. The point is to pick a witness apart. But how do you go after a 12-year-old, one who's just lost his mother, without alienating the jury? One of Jack's defense lawyers gives it a try. Apparently, he's decided on a gentle approach.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
The lawyer asked Collier about his parents' divorce papers and about his mom. Did she show them to you?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Divorce papers can be nasty business. They're often filled with ugly accusations. The defense wants to suggest that Noreen showed them to Collier in order to poison him against Jack, which might explain away Collier's angry testimony. It doesn't go the way the defense hoped. What did Collier glean from the divorce papers his mother shared?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Look what just happened. Of course Noreen was furious at Jack. Of course she was happy to turn Collier against him. But Collier makes Jack out to be the villain. Jack is the one threatening to ship his little sister to the other side of the world. So the defense tries something else. Okay, Jack has a bit of a temper, but it's not that bad, right?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
What? Why would you ask that?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Dude, whose side is this attorney on? So on my scorecard, Collier's testimony is a huge win for the prosecution. Jack's extramarital affairs, I chalk those up to a bad marriage. Inventing an act or two of heroism, pretty standard dating practice, I've heard. But bullying and hitting your kid, threatening and humiliating your wife, a person who does that is capable of terrible things.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Mayer told reporters he was proud of Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
The prosecution rests. Now it's the defense's turn to present Jack's case. But what is the defense's case? Mad Dog Mayer professes to be baffled.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
In criminal trials, the defendant rarely speaks, but he's usually an object of fascination. Everyone wants to know what he's thinking, what he's feeling, as 12 strangers mull his fate. But from the beginning, Jack Boyle has been impossible to read.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
But when the cameras went off, Jack came out of his shell, crawling on all fours, pantomiming escape as if cutting up for his fans. This is Carl Hunnell, the reporter in the courtroom.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
He wanted Oreos. My view? Jack better cut the clown show. His son just gave a blockbuster performance on the stand, painting him as evil. Immediately after Collier's testimony, Jack had made a statement to a local reporter.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Things that were not correct. In other words, Jack is saying that his son lied on the stand. In that case, a witness better counter the kid's lies. So far, the defense has done little more than point out minor inconsistencies in testimony and fumble cross-examinations. If they've been holding back, well, now's the time for the grand reveal.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
But juries, they do like hearing from the accused. They like being able to judge a defendant's credibility for themselves. And keep in mind, the defense does not actually have to prove anything. All they have to do is raise just one doubt that sways one juror, and Jack won't be convicted.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Jack's patients believed him. Women and veterans and doctors bought his tall tales. Why shouldn't one juror believe him?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
When he takes the stand in the trial's fourth and final week, Jack is 47 years old. Right away, Jack's attorney helps him own up to a few things on his terms. Sure, he had a few girlfriends, but he and Noreen had an understanding. It's not like he was sneaking around behind her back. This is the heart of Jack's defense, and yes, he does have one. Jack had no motive to kill Noreen.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Remember, at one point, it was suggested that Jack killed Noreen in order to be with his mistress, Sherry. But that doesn't make sense. Jack and Noreen were already getting divorced. He and Sherry were already settling into a new house with their new baby. Jack's life was great. It's not like Noreen was in the way. Why would he kill her? It's a good question.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Next, Jack has to deal with his Collier problem. Jack's already said he's angry at Collier saying things that were not correct. Collier portrayed him as a mean, punishing father. But Jack wants the jury to know he was a devoted, even doting dad. Jack's lawyer tosses him a softball. He asks him to tell the jury about all the time he spent with Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
but it's a swing and a miss jack says he mostly spent time with collier on weekends went to a couple of his boy scout meetings one time to a basketball game maybe two probably best to move on jack and in any case the part of collier's testimony that jack really needs to undermine is his account of the night noreen disappeared
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Remember, Collier said the noises he heard that night came from his mother's bedroom. Jack says he was in the living room on the couch where he usually slept when Noreen came downstairs and picked a fight about money.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
In other words, the last time he saw her, Noreen was alive and, according to Jack, heading off on her own adventure.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Lieutenant Dave Messmore once told me that Jack lied and Dave knew exactly when. Because, he said, Jack had a tell. When he lied, he blinked a lot. To me, this just sounded like goofy cop lore. But on the witness stand, swearing under oath that he didn't kill his wife, Jack is blinking like a car's turn signal. So now Jack has made his case. The strongest part? For me, it's that he had no motive.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Unfortunately for Jack, the prosecution doesn't have to prove motive. And so at this point, I'm thinking, that's it? That's all the defense has got? No bombshell last-minute alibi, no new eyewitness? Just Jack? All right, well, good luck, Jack. Across the room, Mad Dog Mayor is straining at the end of his leash. It's time for cross-examination, and Mayor wants to take Jack on a little trip.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Hey, Jack, follow me to Erie, Pennsylvania, down to that basement on Wolf Road, why don't you? Testimony showed that Jack personally purchased and then personally installed AstroTurf in a corner of the Wolf Road basement, even though he'd never installed carpet before. It was going to be a children's play area. Noreen's body was found underneath it two weeks later.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
No. Jack says he didn't notice anything out of the ordinary when he installed the AstroTurf. No indentation in the basement floor, no fresh concrete, and certainly no gravesite. By now, Mad Dog is in full attack mode. Pointer waving, scowl on his face, contempt in his voice.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
His bet? Prove that Jack buried Noreen's body and the jury will believe that he murdered Noreen. Now, Mad Dog deftly maneuvers Jack into a corner. Given what Jack has just testified to, there's only two possible explanations for the body in his basement. One, Jack buried her himself. Two, is more involved.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
At some point during the third week of January 1990, unknown conspirators broke into the Wolf Road house, with no signs of forced entry, by the way. They took down shelves built on the AstroTurf, ripped up the AstroTurf Jack had just glued down, they dug a hole in the concrete using a jackhammer like the one Jack had rented, and then buried Noreen.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
And then these crafty criminals put fresh concrete over her body, glued the astroturf back down, reconstructed the shelving on top, and vanished. Whoever this person or persons might be, they'd gone to some spectacular lengths to frame Jack. The facts, as they're known, really don't look good for Jack. Mad Dog Mayor goes on the attack.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Okay, I have been using Mad Dog a lot. It's not false advertising. Here's another Mad Dog snarl. This time he's questioning Jack about Sherry.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Now Mayor wants Jack, or really the jury, to imagine something. Suppose the police had never gotten a search warrant for the Wolf Road house, never dug up the basement, and Jack had moved in with his children.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
So Mad Dog Mayor leaves the jury with this really disturbing image of Collier and his little sister playing on the AstroTurf that covers their mother's dead body. Through everything, Jack stays even, level. In fact, he seems almost befuddled like all this is happening to someone else.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Sounds to me almost like a plea. So is Dr. John F. Boyle Jr. human and normal, or is he a cold-blooded killer? It's now up to the jury to decide.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Jack is looking directly at the judge. He's still calm, still emotionless. The judge sentences him on the spot, life in prison with no chance of parole for 20 years, and then leaves him with a few final words.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Right there in the courtroom, Mad Dog Mayor and Lieutenant Dave Messmore light up some celebratory cigars. Dave has been saving a good one for just this occasion. Then he goes to a payphone. He has someone to call. Collier is at the tennis club practicing groundstrokes, keeping his mind off the trial of his dad. He's wearing his white tennis shorts and sneakers when someone fetches him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
He's taken to a conference room. Dave is on the phone. Yeah, it's good news. They won. Collier helped put his father in jail maybe for the rest of his life. There's a lot to feel good about. But Collier, what is 12-year-old Collier feeling? Mommy's dead. Daddy's headed to prison. It dawns on Collier. He's now effectively an orphan.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Unlock all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to the Binge Podcast channel. Not only will you immediately unlock all episodes of this show, but you'll get binge access to an entire network of other great true crime and investigative podcasts. All ad-free. Plus, on the first of every month, subscribers get a binge drop of a brand new series.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
That's all episodes, all at once. Search for The Binge on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page. Not on Apple? Head to getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. Thank you.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
So let's go into the stately old courthouse in Mansfield, Ohio. It's June 4th, 1990. In the hallway, there are folding chairs set up in front of a big TV screen for anyone who can't find a seat inside the courtroom, which is full to bursting. Jack Boyle sits quietly at the defense table in a tie and shirt sleeves, an attorney on each side.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Throughout the trial, the attorneys will be calm, even-tempered, rarely interrupting, kind of like well-behaved guests. Seated at the prosecution table is what I'll call Team Collier. Lieutenant Dave Messmore, who's been with Collier since the beginning, is seated at one end, Collier would like to be there too, except he's got other obligations. He's in sixth grade, so he's at school.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Listen to all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge, feed your true crime obsession.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
But if the prosecution needs him, he's ready. And they will. Also at the prosecution table is the recently elected chief prosecutor of the county, James Mayer. A chief prosecutor doesn't usually take on individual cases, but Mayer couldn't resist this one. This is the biggest thing to hit Mansfield since Johnny Appleseed passed through in the 1800s.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
If Mayer wins, he'll be a hero, his re-election all but assured. Of course, if he loses, he'll never live it down.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Now, Jim Mayer is a dramatic presence. He looks ordinary, 40 years old, thick, dark hair that matches his dark suits. But he struts around the courtroom like he owns the place, patrols it with a pointer in hand, which he occasionally pokes at a witness. He's got a booming voice. He's sarcastic.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
He's scathing, always on the attack, zealous, maybe overzealous. At times, he barks at witnesses like I've only seen on TV. Yes or no? Yes or no? He's like a mad dog. Yeah, mad dog mayor. I like that. I'm going to use it. So why is Mad Dog Mayor so exercised? I mean, if the cops dig up a body in your basement, you're going to prison, right? Not in this case. Consider the defendant.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Dr. Jack Boyle may be the city's most popular physician. Thousands of patients adore him. They write emotional letters to the newspaper raving about his dedication and kindness. They start a fundraiser to help with his legal fees. Some people still love him. Some people think he's not guilty and they stand right behind him and say he got framed. which seems to be Jack's argument as well.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
He claims he has no idea how Noreen's body got buried in his basement. And then another challenge. Mad Dog has charged Jack with aggravated murder, meaning premeditated murder. And so Mad Dog has to prove that Jack planned this in advance. That's not going to be easy. There's just not a lot of direct evidence.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
And no murder weapon and no eyewitnesses. So Mayer needs a strategy, and he has one. Turns out there's a method to his madness. He doesn't just yell at witnesses. He has an attack plan, and it's relentless. It starts with one incontrovertible piece of evidence, Noreen's body. And so Mad Dog makes the body the star of the show.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Bernard Davis is a local attorney who attended the trial. On the first day of testimony, he watches as prosecutors dim the lights, wheel in a television, and press play on a videotape.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Now Mad Dog rolls out more audiovisual aids. Here comes the jackhammer he claims was used to dig the grave. And there in the courtroom, he just fires it up. The point, I guess, is to show how easy it is to operate. Anyone can do it. It sounds like the building collapsing. Jurors cover their ears. But what connection does that jackhammer have to the good Dr. Boyle?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
And could you tell us why he was there? He, meaning Dr. Boyle. He was in to rent a jackhammer, sir. That's the owner of Easy Rental in Mansfield. How does he know it was Jack? Jack paid with a personal check. And get this, the rental date, December 29th, just two days before Noreen disappeared. Next, Mad Dog brings into the courtroom a box with the rolled up green tarp inside.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
It's the tarp Noreen was buried in. Jurors start coughing. Mad Dog apparently didn't realize the tarp still stunk of death. So Mad Dog stops with the objects and now starts serving up witnesses.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
It's an all-you-can-eat buffet, Detective Dave Messmore, plus detectives from Erie and Mill Creek, the realtor who remembered Jack's odd questions, the previous owner of the house who testifies to Jack's insistence on an early move-in date, a concrete expert, a medical examiner, one of the Boyle's neighbors, and on it goes. All told, Mad Dog will call 67 witnesses.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
I mentioned to Dave, that sure seemed like overkill. Dave said to me, as long as you kill him. Don't you love cop talk? And yet, looking across the room, the defense seems unfazed. Here's Jack's lawyer.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Yeah, you know, ho-hum, there's a body in my client's basement. It happens. But the really cunning part of Mayer's strategy isn't to present evidence of Jack's guilt. It's to go at him personally. This is Lieutenant Dave Messmore.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Mayer's out to show that this guy, who you trusted to take care of your sick kids, isn't trustworthy. He's a creep. First step in the beatdown, Jack's tall tales.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Apparently, the secretary took a census. And that's a total of how many?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
And sitting in the courtroom that day, listening to all this? None other than Jack's girlfriend, Sherry Campbell. Frozen on a bench towards the back of the courtroom, expressionless. Who does Mad Dog call to the witness stand next?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
The trial of Dr. Jack Boyle has everything, murder, money, sex, and at the center of it all, an epic father-son struggle that could send Jack to prison for life.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
And for fans who can't get enough of the Jack Boyle melodrama, this is a delicious moment. Here she is, the other woman, the seductress, the vixen Jack needed to be with at all costs.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
For TV watchers, Sherry might be entertainment. For Mad Dog, Sherry is key to his case. She's motive. Now, the prosecution doesn't need to supply a motive. The law's view is, who cares why Jack killed Noreen, as long as you can show he did kill her. But jurors like a motive. It helps them put the pieces together. So in the trial's second week, the motive walks to the witness stand.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
She's wearing a power suit with broad, padded shoulders, the style of the times. Sherry is 20 years younger than Jack, attractive, with curly, dirty blonde hair.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Sherry gave birth to a daughter on January 12th, 1990, less than two weeks after Noreen's disappearance. The baby's name, Christine, for Jack's mother. So now, Mayer wants his team to impress on the jury that no one can trust Jack, not even the mother of his newborn. After all, Jack didn't tell Sherry he was married until she was halfway through her pregnancy.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
That is definitely not what Mad Dog wanted to hear, that this loyal new mom finds Jack completely trustworthy. So at this point, how does the courtroom scorecard look? The video of the body, the jackhammer, the tarp, they all connect Jack to Noreen's burial and through that to the murder. Hard to believe he doesn't have something to do with this crime. What about character attacks?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 4. The Trial of the Century
Well, in a church-going Midwestern town, infidelity isn't gonna make you a welcome dinner guest. Mothers lock up your daughters, that kind of thing. But Sherry, in my view, I think she backfired on Mad Dog. She was like a character reference for Jack. Plus, Sherry's kind of evidence that his womanizing days are over. So, end the trial here, and I'd say, Jack has a chance of walking.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Still, Jack keeps calling. He also emails me via the prison's messaging system, GTL, and via the post office, sends documents and photos of himself in prison. It seems he has things to tell me. He mentions, among other things, that he wants to come clean. But I know there's another reason he's in touch. Maybe the real reason. Jack knows I'm speaking to Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And what was the instinct about the tarp?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Yeah.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So Jack lifts Noreen's body onto the tarp, wraps her, and carries her to his pickup truck, which is in the driveway. The automatic light from the garage suddenly turns on. No one's around. He places Noreen on the seat in the second row. And then Jack returns to the couch, turns the news on the TV, takes a shower. Collier comes downstairs. Jack tells Collier, mommy took a little vacation.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And then he puts the kids and his mother into his other car, the Range Rover, and drives them to McDonald's for breakfast. After that, he runs an errand to Columbus an hour away, apparently not showing any of the panic he recently experienced. In the afternoon, Jack takes his pickup truck on a three-hour drive to Erie.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
The trip to Erie is one he'd planned on making for good sometime soon, leaving behind his old life, starting a new one. Now, with his wife's body in the back seat of his pickup truck, Jack carries his past with him. On the road to Erie, Jack recalls a spitting rain. So, wipers on, the highway slick. Jack doesn't speed, not his nature. It's quiet in the car.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So in your irrational thinking, what are you thinking?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
When he arrives at the house on Wolf Road, Jack opens the garage door with the key he'd fortunately retrieved just a day before. He carries Noreen's body into the house, into the kitchen.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
The house is completely empty. The sound of Jack's footsteps must echo. The basement stairs start at the kitchen. Jack can't reach the light switch. It's awkward with Noreen's body in his arms, so he sets her down for a minute. The basement is huge and silent except for the hum of the furnace.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack heads to a nook at the far end where he and his girlfriend Sherry had discussed putting a kid's playroom. He fetches the jackhammer.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack places the tarp with Noreen inside against a wall, the bag still over her head. He figures out how to work the jackhammer. It makes an incredible noise, bouncing off the concrete floor and walls. Luckily, his neighbors aren't close. It takes several hours to jackhammer through the basement floor and dig out the dirt below with a shovel. Then there's the body.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
For me, the most disturbing part is what happens next. How does Jack move through the world after burying his wife? He acts as if nothing has happened. He washed his clothes to get rid of the evidence. He drove back to Mansfield and took a shower. And calmly, blithely, he proceeded to tell lie after lie. In the ensuing weeks, no one notices that Jack is under stress. Maybe he's not.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Maybe the panic has just melted away. Sherry doesn't sense anything crazy going on?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And Jack, he still wants to be a father to his son.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So that's Jack's version. And whatever truth value one assigns to his account, it makes me think of one of the last things Jack told the jurors shortly before they found him guilty. I'm human and normal, just like you. Jack, I don't think so. As for Jack's assertion that Noreen's death was an accident, well, it does fit the details. Why was Noreen's body naked when cops dug it up?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Because Noreen came downstairs naked. The thuds Collier heard, Jack falling and Noreen falling. The footsteps Collier heard in the hallway, Jack's as he went to a closet to grab his getaway bag. The blunt force trauma listed in the autopsy, the result of Noreen falling against the footstool. And then Jack doesn't have with him the concrete to fill in the grave or the astroturf to cover it.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
He buys those days later. Maybe he didn't plan this in advance. But for me, another question looms over Jack's account. Jack was the only one present when Noreen died and when she was buried. There's no way to verify many of the details. A lot of people are going to say, well, he's lied so much in the past, why should I believe him now?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
accidental or otherwise. Let's consider this a minute, because even if you accept that Noreen's death was an accident, that the evidence used to prove premeditation was really just happenstance, and that the true reason for the body in the basement is that Jack simply panicked, there's another problem with his story. How about the blunt force trauma? That couldn't have killed her?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
according to this expert in autopsies. How many autopsies do you think you've done?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Cutting open dead bodies is fun?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
This is Dr. Donald Jason. He's been a medical examiner for 40 years, a professor for 20, and my guess is impatient forever. I asked him to review the autopsy report and evaluate the cause of death. Jack told me Noreen died after hitting her head on a footstool. He said he tried to resuscitate her to no avail. In his telling, the plastic bag was just a cosmetic thing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
He couldn't bear to look at her face. According to the original autopsy, Noreen did suffer blunt force trauma, which Dr. Jason concurs could have come from the fall.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But here's the surprise.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So the cause of death?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So wait, it's not the blow to the head that kills her. That only knocked her unconscious. It's the bag that Jack slips over her head. Could Jack Boyle, an experienced physician, have accidentally missed that Noreen was still alive when he came down the stairs? He saw her motionless on the carpet. He says he checked her pulse and her breathing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
I mean, is there any chance you were premature with the bag over the head?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But Collier hasn't responded to an email from Jack in 16 years. And this moment right now is complicated. Jack has been behind bars for almost 35 years. Jack is up for parole later this year. He's already been denied twice. He'll be 82 when he sees the parole board. This may be his final chance. And Jack is convinced that Collier holds the key to his freedom.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So accidentally or otherwise, it appears that Jack did in fact kill Noreen by suffocating her. Why didn't he just admit all this from the start? Say it was an accident. He might have been charged with a lesser crime, spent a lot less time in prison. Why look at the jury and swear you had nothing to do with her death? Jack says he was basically trying to get away with it. He didn't have a plan.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
He had panic. So he went to the witness stand and he lied. Whatever came into his head... Though, Jack, you did stick with the lie for years, well past the point of whatever initial panic gripped you.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But now it's as if a switch flips. It's weird. Jack now says he takes responsibility for Noreen's death and for lying his ass off. but still somehow believes he was railroaded. Seriously, that's the word he uses.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Old timers. According to Jack, they were all in cahoots, including his own lawyer, the judge, the prosecutors, and certainly Dave Messmore, who he says shaped Collier's testimony.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But now Collier is talking to Daddy again, though with reservations.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
I have. One result of my conversations with Jack, an overflowing mailbox. Jack wants to show me all the programs he's completed in prison. Cage your rage, victim awareness, resolving conflict. Jack must have taken every course the prison offers. Toastmasters and flag etiquette are among his credits. Jack is also a peer social worker recruited by the administration and a religious advisor.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack says all this has made him a different person.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Rock Bottom was 1997. Sherry had left him, unaware that Jack had lied to her too. He'd exhausted his legal appeals. He felt like life was over.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Then one day, Jack is sitting in the prison's day room among inmates watching TV, playing cards. He's leafing through the Old Testament when he feels something.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Did God forgive you?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But will anyone else? In 2010, after two decades in prison, Jack was finally eligible for parole. He was denied. The board told him to try again in 10 years. So in 2020, he did. He was denied again.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And so, Jack became convinced that Collier was blocking his parole. And as Jack sees it, Collier speaks for his mother, which gives him a powerful voice.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
In the past, Jack had tried to enlist Collier's support.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Of course, if anyone has good reason to oppose Jack's parole, it's Collier. The question now is, will he ever believe that his father's crime is forgivable?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Okay. Collier doesn't buy the accident version. But guess what? None of this means Collier opposes Jack going free. How are you feeling about his parole?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
I visited Collier one day at his apartment in Santa Monica, California. At 47, he's nearly the same age as his father was when, well, when everything happened. These days, he's more SoCal than Midwest. He's got bleach blonde highlights, a gym addiction, ambitions in the entertainment industry. He lives in a nice one-bedroom apartment that's part workspace. It's lined with tripods and cameras.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
You think it really all comes down to Collier at this point?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
There's a podcast studio upstairs. Yes, Collier has a podcast. It's autobiographical.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So Collier is still captivated by his family history. He doesn't always seem to want to put it behind him. Instead, he goes deeper, keeps unburying secrets. He's learned a lot about his father's. One day, talking to his aunt, his mother's sister, Collier learns about Noreen's secrets.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
For instance, there are the stories his mom told about her wealthy childhood as a member of Philadelphia's Schmidt Brewery family.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Noreen's roots were modest middle class, just like Jack's. One reason they connected, I guess. Another was that they were both in on a con, both trying to appear more than they were. I imagine them at a dinner table of guests, one listening to the other spin fictions about their pasts.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Yes, definitely, I will.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Collier made peace with his mother's lies. Jacks are different. They hurt people. And for Collier, that's fraud. His father's parole is fast approaching, and he still isn't sure what to do. But other people are.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Dave Messmore is 81 now, the same age as Jack. He retired decades ago. Unlike Jack and Collier, he doesn't seem to have changed much. The same stoic, mustachioed, mild-mannered cop who showed up on the Boyle's doorstep and actually listened to the hyper-articulate 11-year-old worried about his mom. Dave's still devoted to Collier. What does he think about Jack living with Collier?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
I sure will.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
As far as Dave is concerned, Jack should die in prison. And he'll tell the parole board that again this year. Nothing Jack can do about this roadblock. But Collier, despite the influence of Dave, has a more complex view.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
A few days later, we helped Collier navigate the prison bureaucracy and set up his own email account. There's a message waiting for him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Since we helped set up his email, Collier's been sending Jack photos of himself, his girlfriend, his dog. But he's nervous about speaking on the phone. And they've arranged a call.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
It's a lot. Then one day, after years of silence, Collier's phone rings.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
The prison's phone system is spotty, which seems like a metaphor. Will this father and son be able to hear each other, to connect? As it happens, the Super Bowl is on as Jack calls. The pair has always talked sports. And Philadelphia, Jack's hometown, is competing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
With the ice broken, they chat about family illnesses. Yeah, they're a family again, apparently. And then, Collier turns to the subject that's on both their minds.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack has a halfway house lined up, but that's only for a short time.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack is optimistic about making parole. He's optimistic about a lot of things. Apparently, Jack believes that at 82, he will jump back into the workforce, fend for himself. He must know that the parole board wants assurance that a parolee won't be a burden on society. What Jack really needs is a family member to take him in. Weirdly, it's the same situation Collier once faced.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And so Jack asks about a subject that's constantly on his mind.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And then the phone cuts Jack off. Collier can't hear his dad. His words become a kind of absurdist monologue, which I find heartbreaking.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Later, I asked Jack about the call. His first call with Collier in years. Jack felt great about it, relieved. He felt a real connection.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Was it? Yeah. And then you backed off.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack and Collier roommates? I'm not too sure about that. Neither is Collier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
All right, sending. Should a son rescue a father who may not deserve to be rescued? Collier has a decision to make. From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode six, The Confessions of Jack Boyle.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Listen to all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge, feed your true crime obsession.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
At this point, Jack Boyle and I have spoken for hours and hours. My wife isn't thrilled that I spend so much time chatting with a convicted wife killer. But if someone wants to understand what really happened, you have to talk to Jack. Jack is the black hole at the center of this story. For years, people who followed this murder talked and talked about Jack. But Jack, he wouldn't talk to anyone.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
On the witness stand almost four decades ago, Jack swore he had nothing to do with his wife's death. He said he had no idea how she ended up buried in his basement. But it's been a long time since that testimony. A lot has changed. Jack says he's changed. He says he's ready to tell what really happened to Noreen. So let's call this Jack's version.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack starts at the beginning, the night Noreen disappeared. It's a little before three in the morning on December 31st, 1989 at the Boyle residence in Mansfield, Ohio. 11-year-old Collier is asleep in his bedroom upstairs with his Batman clock and his Garfield toys. Noreen retired early to her bedroom, also upstairs. Jack's mother is staying with them for the holiday.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Noreen's bedroom is across the hall from Collier's. But according to Jack, she isn't there because she's marched down the stairs to the first floor living room. The living room has been pretty much Jack's bedroom for years. He sleeps there on the couch, usually undisturbed. But tonight, he says, Noreen shakes him awake.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
According to Jack, Noreen is furious. And there's something else unusual about her.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So was she naked?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
That's unusual. That's like, what is going on? This is a couple that hasn't slept together in years.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
According to Jack, Noreen picks a fight about, well, about everything. The Boyles divorce proceedings officially started about a month earlier, and Noreen, according to Jack's theory, is just now coming to grips with her future.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
He reasons that after years of being a physician's wife, with the leisure time and the disposable income that comes along with it, Noreen hates the idea of working again, which is what a judge said was in her future.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
But back to the living room. Noreen and Jack are arguing.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack says he was surprised by Noreen's intense anger. Their relationship was frosty, not heated.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Okay. Jack Boyle and I have been speaking regularly for several months. I sometimes wonder why he makes the effort. I ask a lot of intrusive questions.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
A cake knife is pretty much a butter knife, blunt and rounded. So Noreen is up now, waving the cake knife. Jack sits on the couch below her, then stands up. He's 6'3", she's 5'4".
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
A heavy wooden footstool. Now, according to Jack, Noreen is lying motionless on the floor. So what does Dr. Jack Boyle think?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And then what happens? You come down and what?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
And she's not getting up. Noreen is not moving at all.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack said he did CPR, chest compressions, for 15 minutes.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack, what are you thinking?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So Jack is staring at Noreen. She's on her back, motionless, almost naked, lying on their beige living room carpet, her head next to the footstool. What did she look like?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
What was wrong with her face that you couldn't look at it?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack goes to the kitchen and gets a garbage bag, white and opaque. He slipped it over Noreen's head.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
So you're sure she was dead?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
To Erie, to the house he'd bought just two weeks earlier.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 6. The Confessions of Jack Boyle
Jack had rented the jackhammer two days earlier to do home repairs, he said. The prosecution claimed this was evidence of premeditation.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Listen to all episodes of Finding Mom's Killer ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge, feed your true crime obsession. The Binge.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
It's the night of Noreen Boyle's disappearance, and Collier is in bed. He's heard strange noises, strange voices, strange footsteps. But when everything goes quiet, he manages to fall back to sleep. The next morning when he wakes up, the first thing he does is run to his mother's bedroom. She isn't there. She always makes her bed first thing in the morning, but this time the sheets are a mess.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Collier did hear what his father said, but he'd actually been preparing for a moment just like this. He knew his parents were going through a divorce. There was screaming in the house, tempers flaring, and Collier, like his hero Batman, was always ready for action.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So when his mother went missing, Collier decided it was up to him to find her. From Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media, this is Finding Mom's Killer. I'm Steve Fishman. This is the story of how a precocious kid joined forces with a most unlikely partner. Together, they set out to solve the mystery of his mother's disappearance.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Noreen's friends did call the police. And that's how word of her disappearance made its way to the Mansfield Police Department and to Dave Messmore's desk. And now, sitting in the classroom, there was one more thing Collier wanted to make sure Dave understood. He wanted their meeting kept confidential.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
For his part, as Dave interviewed Collier that day, he thought, this kid just might be on to something.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
The interview ended. Kaya went back to class, then home. He knew Dave would be stopping by that night, and he was on edge.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
And so Collier and Dave are now a dynamic duo. The precocious preteen and the mild-mannered middle-aged detective. It's like something out of a comic book. Did you think of Batman? I did think of Batman. What did you think?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Collier, of course, wasn't quite Batman, more of a Robin. You know, the boy wonder, the junior partner. And in that role, he was determined to help Dave track down his mother.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
And Lieutenant Dave Messmore was determined to hold up his end.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So now Dave's all in. Jack Boyle won't talk to him. Hmm. That makes Dave pretty suspicious. And so he decides his next step. Take a closer look at the good doctor.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Finding Mom's Killer is a production of Orbit Media. Creator and host, Steve Fishman. That's me. Our senior producer is Drew Nellis. Our producer and production coordinator, Austin Smith. Our story editor, Emile Klein. Fact check by Ryan Alderman. Mixing and sound design by Scott Somerville. Our lawyers are at Davis Wright Tremaine.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Along the way, they'd unearth one terrible family secret after another. Episode one, A Little Vacation. On New Year's Day, 1990, six months before that 12-year-old boy took the witness stand, the Mansfield, Ohio Police Department was swamped with the usual holiday stuff. Bar brawls, disorderly conduct. So when a 44-year-old woman named Noreen Boyle was reported missing, it was not a top priority.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producer is Jonathan Hirsch. Special thanks to Emily Rasek, Steve Ackerman, Catherine St. Louis, Sammy Allison, Fisher Stevens, Rhea Julian, Dan Bobcoff. At WME, we'd like to thank Evan Krasick, Marissa Hurwitz, and Ben Davis. We want to also thank Carl Hunnell at the Richland Source for the generous use of his podcast studio.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
This is Lieutenant Dave Messmore of the Mansfield Police. When Noreen Boyle's disappearance landed on his desk, he didn't think much of it. A couple of uniformed patrolmen had been sent over to her house to check things out. Their conclusion? Nothing to worry about.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
As you might have gathered, Lieutenant Dave Messmore isn't exactly the excitable type. In appearance, he kind of fades into the background. He's got thinning hair, a lampshade mustache, sensible glasses. He takes his time. He's methodical. He assumed Noreen Boyle was just an unhappy wife in an unhappy marriage who needed a little alone time.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Then one day at his office, he received a phone call from a close friend of Noreen's.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So on January 2, Dave climbed into his department-issued used Oldsmobile and drove over to Noreen Boyle's house. Now, Dave was the Mansfield Police Department's head of major crimes. He wasn't supposed to go chase down leads on low priority cases. But Dave, low-key, laconic Dave, is full of surprises.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
By this point, he'd been on the force for 15 years, and he'd developed a reputation for striking out on his own, for bucking his superiors. He once put away a friend, a fellow cop no less, for murder. People learned it was best not to get in his way. Another time, he had a kid with a knife cornered. Other cops debated a next step. Dave rushed him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Dave, without blackjack, figured he'd head over to the Boyle residence, have a word with Noreen's husband, a prominent local doctor named Jack Boyle. He arrived at the house, walked up the front steps, rang the doorbell.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
This is Collier Boyle. He was the kid you heard testifying at the top of the show. He's a lot older now. When Lieutenant Dave Messmore arrived at the Boyle residence, it was Collier's grandmother, that's his father's mother, who answered the door.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Collier made an impression on Dave. This was a kid who dressed in chinos and penny loafers. He had a perfectly coiffed brown bob. He looked like a tiny adult.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Kaya was surprised. He hadn't expected this cop who suddenly showed up on the doorstep to actually listen to him.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Dave did take Collier seriously. Still, he didn't have any clues to follow. Just the concerns of an anxious adolescent son. Dave, he decided to talk it over with his wife, who refers to him as hubby, by the way.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
It's 1990, and we're in a courtroom in Mansfield, Ohio. The prosecution's star witness has just taken the stand. He's about to describe something that happened one fateful night a few months ago.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So once again, Dave headed to the Boyle residence, where he was met once again by Dr. Jack Boyle's mother, Collier's grandmother.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So later that evening, yet again, Dave drove to the Boyle residence. For those keeping score, that's his third visit of the day.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
I said, hmm. Hmm, that's Dave's characteristically restrained reaction to any new suspicion. So Dave, now suspicious, decided he'd start looking into Dr. Jack Boyle. As it turned out, Dr. Boyle's patients really loved him. They described him as funny, intelligent, gregarious, caring.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
The kind of doctor who'd go above and beyond, who'd make house calls and stay up all night at the bedside of a sick patient. Even at the police department, Dave discovered his fellow cops were fans.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Plus, one of Jack's friends said he was devastated that Noreen left. She recalled Jack sobbing on the phone to her. She's gone. She's gone. And then Dave learned something that made Noreen's disappearance seem understandable.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
In fact, Noreen had filed for divorce less than two months before. And it was contentious. There were fancy cars to fight over, a lot of money in the bank, child support, alimony, joint credit cards. Maybe Dave's original hunch had been right. In the midst of a rough separation, with both parties sleeping under the same roof, Noreen just needed a few days to herself.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
And why did her son insist that something was wrong? Dave decided it was time to get more details from his prime source, the one inside the Boyle household. He phoned the private school that Collier attended and requested that the principal arrange a meeting. This is just what Collier had been hoping for.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
On January 8th, 1990, Collier Landry Boyle sat down with Lieutenant Dave Messmore in an elementary school classroom. The kind with those small chairs. Dave is six feet tall, but he figured it'd be good to be on the same level as Collier. It'd make him comfortable.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
A little more than a week earlier, December 30th, Collier and his mother were sitting at a table having chili for dinner.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
Then Collier headed upstairs to his bedroom. He may have struck people as a miniature adult, but his bedroom was definitely that of a child.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
Finding Mom's Killer | 1. A Little Vacation
So safe in his bedroom with his Batman clock and his Garfield dolls, Collier fell asleep. And then in the middle of the night, something woke him.