78 Minutes

Sticky Fingers, Risky Business 

On February 4, 2010 a family of four mysteriously vanished from their Fallbrook, Ca home. Today is the 6 year anniversary of that incident. It would end with their fatal demise.

 

Britt Imes, DA: In comparison to items that were found in or near the graves, was there any indication of paint-type supplies or painting activities consistent in those graves?

Detective Joseph Steers: Yes. There was blue painter’s tape in the graves, in a white shop towel. There was paint on Summer McStay’s brassiere. And paint on the sledgehammer.

Preliminary Hearing,  pg 48

 

Most suspect that Chase Merritt, who is charged with the murder of Joseph McStay, his wife Summer and children Gianni and Joseph, jr., packed their bodies into the back of his Chevy truck and rolled away into the night on February 4, 2010. Some time between that night and the 7th, he buried the family in two graves in the sprawling desert of the Mojave.

Or that is the contention.

Logistically, it’s a very fine line to pull this off. Let’s review parts of the timeline and facts that we know.

On February 4 Joseph McStay – while in Fallbrook – placed a phone call to Chase Merritt at 5:47. The call lasts 2 1/2 minutes. What is very telling is Merritt’s phone was turned off or disabled at 5:48. What happened at that moment? Did Chase simply hang up on Joseph leaving him to continue talking to dead air for over 2 minutes? Why would he do that?

The next activity we have is a vehicle – not the McStay Trooper – caught on camera, backing, or pulling out of the family’s driveway at 7:47.

It is supposed that Chase drove to the Fallbrook home at 5:48 and brutally murdered the family with a sledgehammer. Drive time for that time of day, a Thursday, to be roughly 1:20-1:25 minutes. Assuming he didn’t stop for  gas, this puts Chase at the home at around 7:15. This leaves 32 minutes.

Between 7:59 and 8:05 there is activity on Joseph’s desktop. A check is created for “chase merritt” for $4,000 and then deleted.

Sometime after this it is believed Merritt departed with the family. The one problem with a 8:05 departure is Joseph’s cell phone calling Merritt’s phone at 8:28. It pinged in Fallbrook. So this gives a broader timeline for Chase Merritt to murder and clean up.

So he had maybe more like 78 minutes, at least.

And paint though? I don’t think it’s possible.

Going back to the items coved in the graves, there was blue painter’s tape in a shop towel with Summer McStay. There was also paint on her bra.

Remember, there were two separate graves, one with Joseph and Gianni (grave A), the other with Summer and Joseph jr. (grave B). Two sets of tire tracks. The tracks to grave B measured a little wider than the other. It is believed as suggested in the preliminary hearing that this was do to muddier conditions. Meaning, made at two different times, possibly days apart.

Here is a video of flooding in Victorville, where the family was buried. This is more than likely from a storm that went through the area on January 20.

 

Could Chase have put all four bodies in his truck at once? Would he risk it?

Entirely plausible. But I want to explore some other possibilities.

First let’s take a look at Merritt’s truck. He owned a 1999 Chevy 3500 utility truck. Here is Michael McStay describing it at the 1:00 mark.

 

1999 Chevy 3500 (Not Merritt’s actual truck).

 

Merritt’s truck.

Considering most people’s work truck is not devoid of “stuff” like we see in the above picture, it doesn’t leave a lot of room to work with in an already limited truck-bed space.

Joseph was probably killed in one of the downstairs rooms. Considering his injuries, if it was the kitchen or living room, blood would be literally everywhere. Floor, walls, ceiling, cabinets, etc.

We can assume, because of the contents found with the children (bath towels), that Summer and the boys were killed in or near the upstairs bathroom. Again, floor, walls, ceiling, cabinets and possibly the adjacent closet would be littered with blood splatter. Of course, there is also the bright white robe in the center of the bathroom, obviously clear splatter of any kind.

There is the absence of bed sheets or blankets on the beds. They’re not in the items listed collected from the house. Were they bloodied and disposed together with the missing towels, purse and phones? Where and when did he do this? I’m of the impression that there may be more to these missing items and could be part of a larger conspiracy.

I have stated in the past that the murders were probably quick. However, I feel the opposite now. I think the murders were maybe more drawn out.

If Merritt wanted to get away with murder, he would not rush feverishly through 78 minutes bludgeoning four people, thoroughly cleaning floors and walls and then to effectively paint. If Merritt did rush through all of this, there would have probably been a lot of gleaming evidence left behind that he would overlook. This is pretty common in these types of crimes.

I believe that Joseph was the first to be attacked but the last to die. Considering the blows to his head he may have been first attacked from behind, with Joseph having no idea what was about to occur.

TrueCrime had an interesting take on how things may have happened

Chase arrives at the McStay home parking his truck close by. He rings the doorbell Joseph is

expecting him. Small talk is made and Chase opens the sliding glass door to the back yard and lets out the dogs without anyone noticing. Joseph and Chase go into the office to conduct business. Chase stand behind Joseph and quickly removes a hammer that he has concealed in his jacket and with one hard swing knocks Joseph out with the hammer or possibly killing him. He doesn’t have time to check if Joseph is still alive ties him up with electrical cord in case he regains consciousness. Chase quickly approaches Summer and bludgeons her with the hammer. He finally returns to kill the children. It was all over very fast.

The following is a loose-knit timeline that I have developed based on things we know thus far.

After Joseph, the killer goes for Summer. He cautiously makes his way upstairs to the master bathroom/bedroom. She suffered multiple facial and frontal fractures, probably because she met him head-on to protect her babies. The children are murdered at this point as well, in the bathroom, with Merritt closing the door behind him so no one escapes. It would be a very brutal scene.

Merritt  makes his way back downstairs to Joseph.

There is something crucial to point out regarding TrueCrime’s theory, Joseph was not tied up with the electrical cord. They may have concluded this before the preliminary, I don’t know. But the cord was found to be around Joseph’s neck, tied in a knot.

I will touch on that tidbit further down, because, it is important.

So, back to that blue tape. As I said, I don’t think Chase Merritt had time to paint on the night of the 4th. There is just no way when you consider the logistics of it all. You have to consider as well, Merritt – or the killer – is not thinking rationally. Or, being calm, cool and collected.  He is probably completely unraveling. And frantic. Some real shit just went down.

Merritt only takes Joseph and Gianni at this point, leaving Summer and Joseph, jr behind. It’s 8:30ish (Joseph’s phone call at 8:28) and he thinks he can drop the bodies off at another location and then come back in a bit. Merritt’s phone next pings in Mira Loma at 9:32. Drive time for that time of day is 62 minutes.

Sometime on the 5th Chase returns to retrieve the bodies left behind. It is daytime, he can see a lot better. He cleans up anything he missed before and paints over the areas that there was blood splatter. Chase not a stranger to painting, he tapes off the bathroom trim and paints the entire walls. Remember, Summer’s bra had a drip of paint on it consistent with her lying on her side catching the drip or cast-off. Like, she was right there laying dead with the perp painting. Unless Summer painted half naked but I seriously doubt it.

Upstairs bathroom. Notice the single robe mentioned in the Preliminary.

Secondary upstairs bathroom. Supposedly where a soiled diaper was found. Could this be part of the murder scene?

Q Was there something unique about the paint on the
brassiere?
A Yes, it was horizontal across the brassiere, consistent
with either Summer McStay painting sideways, lying sideways, or
incapacitated, or a drip falling on her brassiere.

Preliminary Hearing, pg 48-49

The painter – Chase – removes the tape, couples it together with a shop towel and the tape. This is how I believe the tape ended up in the grave with Summer. Like I said, I can’t accept painting was done on Feb 4.

After painting was done, Merritt discreetly loads the bodies of Summer and Joseph, jr. into his truck. He stores them somewhere, maybe leaving them in his truck at the warehouse and he used another vehicle to go home.

The next day, Feb 6, Merritt heads out early. He gets the truck/bodies and heads to Victorville. It is where he buried the others. He wants to bury them together, either out of some strange honor to Joseph or because he has familiarity with the location now. He wasn’t discovered before. It is rainy and the wash is muddied now. Difficult to navigate and see. Chase almost misses the spot. He locates it and backs in. Once the bodies are buried, Merritt goes to leave and he discovers it is too muddy. He is stuck. If you look at the tracks to Grave B, you can see the deep ruts left behind. He manages to get out. Somehow.

Merritt, back on interstate 15, being confidant that the deal was done, turns his phone back on and starts making phone calls.

 Joseph McStay was found in the grave wrapped in, what is believed to be, the missing futon cover from the home. Around the cover was 1 or 2 red ratcheting straps. Why didn’t Summer McStay have similar bindings? Why bind up a dead person to begin with?

Was Joseph still alive or being kept alive for a purpose?

One of the more curious items found with Joseph was what has been described as an extension cord. A cord with only the male end cut off. The placement of this cord is also baffling. It was around Joseph’s neck, tied in a knot.

Something has been bugging me about these very details since they had been released. So, like my earlier point, why tie an extension cord, in a knot, around a dead persons neck. And the male end is missing. Why?

One of the items found in grave with Summer was a female end of an extension cord. Where’s the rest of the cord? Why just the end??

Maybe the reports have their wires crossed (no pun intended) and what was found with Joseph was a cord missing the female end? Could two reports or accounts be wrong?

A possible disturbing thought is, they (at least Joseph) may have been tortured through electrocution. I know, it’s an extreme departure from what we know. But let it settle in a bit. Look at what we do know. The cord was around his neck, in a knot. An end, male or female, was found in a grave 20 feet away, buried at a different time.

Where are the phones and Summer’s purse? Why bury a cord end, a child’s backpack and yet not these other items? Detective Steers also testified in the hearing that the Fallbrook home was completely devoid of any towels. What happened to all the towels?

 Is there a third burial site after all?