Meaningless Mutilation Murders

Farmington, New Mexico sits in the northwest corner of the state, in San Juan County, close to the Four Corners and the northern edge of Arizona. James introduces it as a town of about 46,700 people with high crime and a difficult reputation.

The story begins on 24 November 1996, the Sunday before Thanksgiving. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now They drove north of Farmington to Choke Cherry Canyon and buried the weapons.

Four nights later, on Thanksgiving, 28 November 1996, a party was held at an apartment near the Animas Valley Mall. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now They found nobody, and shortly after midnight they stopped at the Eclectic, where the lights were on. Joseph Fleming, a twenty-four-year-old security guard and former US Army sergeant first class, was there, and eighteen-year-old Matthew Trecker was asleep in a back room. details of the account remain covered until revealed

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now The swords were decorative and blunt; the two men sawed at Trecker's neck but could not get through, and Trecker died of the stab wounds. Fleming died of asphyxiation and blood loss from a crushed larynx and a deep cut across his throat.

The store was locked, the key broke in the lock and the back door had an alarm they did not know how to disarm. They eventually got out through another door, drove back to Choke Cherry Canyon, cleaned up and agreed never to speak of it. details of the account remain covered until revealed

On the morning of 29 November, the day after Thanksgiving, a regular customer found the store locked when it should have been open. Looking through the window, he saw a foot on the floor. Police forced entry and found the two bodies. The knife display was almost empty and the store had been ransacked; the case looked like a robbery of decorative weapons. The only strong physical evidence was a size ten and a covered namef bloody footprint. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it

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the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it They went to the Turnaround Bar, where they met Donald Tosi, a forty-year-old Navajo man from Ganado, Arizona, who had come to Farmington to sell plasma. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now They beat Tosi, stabbed his eyes with sharpened sticks and threw him off a cliff about 150 feet high. A hiker found the decomposing body at the base of the cliff in late April 1998; the fall had broken his pelvis and ribs, but his skull had blunt-force injuries inflicted before the fall. His pockets were empty, but his name was written inside his boots. Fingerprints confirmed his identity within a couple of weeks. The investigation went cold.

On 6 June 2000 Betty Jean Lee, a thirty-six-year-old Navajo nursing student and divorced mother of five from Shiprock, went out with two friends, Gloria and Tina, to the Turnaround Bar. The friends left with two men for a motel, leaving Betty stranded twenty-five miles from home. She walked to a 7-Eleven pay phone and called her brother again and again; he did not answer, and she began to cry. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now

details of the account remain covered until revealed Betty jumped out and ran, but they caught her. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it The blade penetrated her breastbone and the sac around her heart but missed the heart. She pulled the knife out and threw it towards a ravine. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed They dragged her body into the bushes by the ravine and kicked her clothes off the road.

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Later that morning an electrical line inspector working south of Kirtland noticed a trail of blood drops in the dust. He followed it and found Betty Lee's body under branches and brush. She had been stabbed in the chest and bludgeoned in the head; the cause of death was blunt-force head trauma. There were three sets of footprints and three different tyre treads, a bloody knife in the bushes, a bloody sledgehammer near the road and women's clothing scattered about.

Police identified Betty Lee and found the mobile phone. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed They found size ten and a covered namef work boots with blood on them, a bloodstained black T-shirt, blood on the steering wheel and passname withheld hereer door of the car, blood on a torch in the glove box and one of Betty Lee's earrings on the floor. details of the account remain covered until revealed

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now He then told police about Donald Tosi. details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it

this part of the story is covered for now The prosecution case was that he kidnapped her from the pay phone intending to sexually assault her, killed her during the attempt and tampered with evidence. The convenience store clerk, a friend who heard him say he was going to stick somebody that night, the woman who sharpened the knife and Charlie Bergen all testified, along with blood-spatter expert Ron a covered namelert. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now

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this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed In 2009 the state legislature repealed the death penalty prospectively. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now Joseph Fleming and Matthew Trecker are buried at Greenlawn Cemetery in Farmington.