The Girl in the Leaves Read online

  Because of the disturbing circumstances at the home on King Beach Drive, the matter was taken on by the KCSO Detective Division. This division was headed by Lieutenant Gary Rohler, and included Detective Sergeant Roger Brown, and Detectives Thomas Bumpus, David Light and Doug Turpen. Prior to that November, almost all the deaths investigated by the KCOS detectives were the result of accidents.

  On November 11, 2010, the detectives weren’t quite sure what they had on their hands at King Beach Drive. It became case number 10-2071, and one of the lead investigators was Detective David Light. He noted early on, “Deputy Chuck Statler tried to contact the residence but was unable to contact anyone. On Thursday, November 11, 2010, officers were again unable to make contact and also found that Tina [Herrmann]’s children, Sarah and Kody Maynard, did not go to school November 11th.”

  After Valerie Haythorn’s discovery of the blood in the house on King Beach Drive, Sergeants Tom Durbin and Al Dexter of KCSO were sent to Tina’s house to investigate. The sergeants entered the house looking for someone who might be injured, but what they found was extensive amounts of blood on the front room carpet and what appeared to be bloody drag marks to the bathroom. There was also blood in the basement and a Jeep that did not belong to Tina in the garage.

  The sergeants immediately called for KCSO detectives. Detective Light responded, as did Detective Sergeant Roger Brown. Brown noted that he arrived at Tina’s house at 4:36 PM on November 11, and met with Sergeants Durbin and Dexter in the yard. The area around Tina’s house was soon secured with crime scene tape.

  Detective Light called Stephanie’s house, and by that time someone was home. Light noted that Tina’s friend, Stephanie Sprang, was also missing. Stephanie’s live-in boyfriend, Ron Metcalf, told detectives that neither he nor Stephanie’s children had seen or heard from her since 12:30 PM on Wednesday, November 10, when Ron had last spoken to her by phone. Ron told Detective Sergeant Brown that Stephanie had not been home when he arrived there later on November 10. Ron added that he’d made several attempts to reach Stephanie via her cell phone, but had only gotten her voice mail.

  Ron also informed Detective Sergeant Brown that Tina and Stephanie had had plans to look at apartments the day before, because “Tina was going to leave Greg and move out.” Tina and Stephanie were supposedly going to look at an apartment complex owned by a man named Tony, though when Brown contacted Tony, he claimed he had never heard from either woman about renting an apartment.

  After the discoveries at the house, Detective Sergeant Brown contacted Knox County Prosecutor John Thatcher and requested that he prepare a search warrant. Thatcher replied that if Brown could find Tina’s boyfriend, Greg Borders, he could get permission to search from him.

  As it turned out, Brown didn’t have to go looking for Greg Borders. Greg arrived at the house on King Beach Drive at 5:30 PM. Greg explained to the detectives that a family member had told him about the police activity at his house and he’d hurried home to find out what was going on. Apparently Greg hadn’t had his cell phone on earlier, and had been unaware of the police presence until he’d gotten word about it from an uncle.

  Greg explained to the officers that he’d left the residence on November 10 at 3:00 AM to go to work. Greg said that he worked throughout the day and then stayed with a friend that night. Greg added that he and his friend had been golfing all day on November 11, and he hadn’t seen Tina since he went to bed on November 9.

  Detective Sergeant Brown read a KCSO Permission to Search form, and Greg said that he understood it and signed the document. Brown then instructed Greg to remain on the back porch, and he and Lieutenant Gary Rohler entered the house by an unlocked back door. Whether Valerie Haythorn had unlocked that door on her way out, or an assailant had, the detectives didn’t know at that point. Brown later documented what he saw: “As I looked into the kitchen and living room areas, I observed what appeared to be blood and drag marks on the living room carpet and what appeared to be blood on the linoleum at the top of the basement stairs. At this time, Lt. Rohler and I exited the residence to await BCI&I Crime Scene Agents.” BCI&I was Ohio’s Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation.

  Brown next received verbal consent from Greg Borders to examine his arms, hands and torso for scratches and injuries. After the examination, Brown noted that Greg did not appear to have any injuries on him.

  The actual affiant for the search warrant, the person responsible for detailing the warrant’s purpose, was KCSO Detective David Light. Even though Greg Borders had given a verbal okay to search the residence, it was best to have a written search warrant signed by a judge. Detective Light began by stating that he had been with KCSO since 1993 and had been a detective since 2008. In his time with the sheriff’s office, he’d investigated twelve cases involving felonious assault, one kidnapping and twenty deaths.

  The main part of Light’s search-warrant request included the lines, “At approximately 4:15 PM on November 11, 2010, Sergeant Tom Durbin and Sergeant Dexter responded to Ms. Haythorn’s call, entered Ms. Herrmann’s residence where they observed bloodstains on the living room and hallway carpet, apparent drag marks in the bloodstains on the hallway carpet going in the direction of the bathroom and a large amount of blood around the tub and toilet area. And they observed a gallon jug of what appeared to be [motor] oil in the hallway with a ten inch trail of liquid leading from the hallway to a bedroom.” In fact, the motor oil had been dripped on the rugs in several portions of the house.

  Light added that Sergeants Durbin and Dexter had also observed bloodstains going down the stairs to a lower-level garage where a light gray or green 1996 Jeep Cherokee with Ohio plates was parked.

  The Jeep Cherokee was known to be driven by Stephanie Sprang, but the registration listed a man named Jeremy Biggs as the owner. Just how Biggs fit into all this, the investigators did not yet know.

  KCSO deputies spread throughout the neighborhood, questioning neighbors about the missing individuals. Investigators noted immediately that no houses were right next door to the King Beach Drive address—it was fairly isolated, with a patch of woods across the street and farmland across Magers Drive.

  * * *

  Even before the search team began processing Tina Herrmann’s house, miles away Matt Hoffman was deciding to put into action his plan to burn down the house on King Beach Drive.

  After first making sure that Sarah Maynard was completely restrained and could not get away, sometime after 6:00 PM on Thursday, November 11, Hoffman drove his Toyota Yaris back to Gambier near Kenyon College and the parking lot where he had left Tina’s blue pickup truck. He was going to collect the gas cans from the truck, fill them up with gasoline and then go to the residence. But before he could access the pickup, fate intervened.

  Hoffman had abandoned the pickup at the Kokosing Gap Trail parking lot off of Laymon Road and State Route 229, an area used as a launching spot for canoes on the Kokosing River. At 6:55 PM, KCSO Deputy Aaron Phillips was driving around on his routine patrol when he spotted the blue pickup truck. Deputy Phillips already knew that Deputy Charles Statler had spotted a similar pickup truck in Tina Herrmann’s driveway at around 11:15 PM on November 10. What was it doing here now?

  Then Deputy Phillips spotted something else unusual. There was a silver car parked near the edge of another nearby lot, even though the lot was now closed for the night, and a man was sitting in the car behind the steering wheel.

  Deputy Phillips approached the vehicle and asked the man what he was doing there and asked to see his driver’s license. The man cooperated and handed over his license. Deputy Phillips checked it and noted that the driver was Matthew Hoffman who lived on the 3000 block of Apple Valley Drive, and that his driver’s license had just been renewed on October 26. Phillips asked Hoffman if the Apple Valley Drive address was close to King Beach Drive, and Hoffman said that his mother lived there, but added
that he now lived at 49 Columbus Road in Mount Vernon. Asked once again what he was doing there, Hoffman said that he was waiting for his girlfriend, Sarah.

  The name Sarah didn’t mean anything to Deputy Phillips at that point, and he told the young man the parking lot was closed after dark. Hoffman said okay and left.

  * * *

  The incident with Deputy Phillips had effectively thwarted Hoffman’s plan to retrieve the gas cans from the pickup truck. Hoffman felt as if he’d dodged a bullet at the parking lot, though, at least law enforcement officers weren’t looking for him—yet. But time was ticking away and he still had to burn down the house and all the incriminating evidence inside.

  Since Hoffman didn’t want to drive his Yaris directly to the house on King Beach Drive, he returned home to think over what his next move would be. Not only was there a problem with his entering that house, but he’d also left several items in the woods across the street from the house. What if officers decided to look in the woods? He had to retrieve those things, or they could lead directly back to him. Matthew Hoffman had a lot more work to do before all of this was over.

  ELEVEN

  A Footprint in Blood and Oil

  Because Tina’s pickup truck had been found so close to Kenyon College in the town of Gambier, the school was put into a state of lockdown. At 10:15 PM November 11, e-mails and phone calls were sent out to students and faculty. All of the messages warned people to stay in place, which meant no wandering around the campus grounds. Students not already in their dormitories were escorted there by campus security officers. Students residing at the Brown Family Environmental Center, near where Tina’s pickup had been found, were transported to Weaver Cottage on the Kenyon campus.

  Additional campus security officers were brought in to help secure the campus, and the sixteen hundred students cooperated during the lockdown. Mark Ellis, communications director for Kenyon College, later said, “We were contacted by the Knox County Sheriff’s Office, who [informed us] of a crime at Apple Valley and the possibility that a dangerous person might be on campus.” This lockdown was taken seriously by students and faculty.

  Back at the Kokosing Gap Trail parking lot, investigators were busy taking multiple photos of Tina Herrmann’s pickup truck and scouring the surrounding area for evidence. Once they finished the onsite investigation, they loaded the pickup onto a car carrier and took it to a police impound yard. There it would be searched in a more thorough manner under very controlled conditions. Of vital interest to the investigators was whether any blood could be found in the pickup, as well as any fingerprints that did not match those of Tina, Sarah, Kody or Stephanie. Meanwhile, Hoffman moved Sarah down into his dark basement and onto a bed of leaves that he had constructed for her, and removed her blindfold. She recalled later, “I was really afraid when I was first taken there. It was so dark, you couldn’t see anything. There were no windows, so you couldn’t tell if it was day or night.

  “He would come down there sometimes and just stand there and stare at me. He didn’t say a word, just stared. And then he would go back upstairs. I don’t know which was worse—him not saying anything or him saying something. I couldn’t figure out what he wanted when he didn’t say anything. It was hard to tell what he was thinking that way. Mostly I just laid alone in the dark. And even though there were blankets and stuff that he put there, it was always cold. At least it was better than lying on the floor [of the bathroom] where he first kept me. That was not only cold, it was hard too.

  Even though it was almost impossible to keep her thoughts from conjuring up frightening images of what might happen next, she later said that she tried to suppress these thoughts as best she could. Her plan was to only deal with whatever was happening at the moment. Especially when it came to interacting with her captor.

  While Hoffman was planning his next move, BCI&I Special Agents Edward Lulla and Edward Carlini arrived at Tina Herrmann’s residence on King Beach Drive. It was 9:45 PM on Thursday, November 11. Outside the house, they were briefed by KCSO Sheriff David Barber and several KCSO detectives, who gave the BCI&I agents all the background on the incidents that had led up to the request that they be there: the report by Valerie Haythorn, the blood in the house and the missing individuals.

  Sheriff Barber added that a KCSO patrol deputy had spotted the pickup truck that Tina usually drove, in a parking lot of the Kokosing Gap Trail. The pickup truck had been towed to a storage yard for analysis.

  After the briefing, Agents Lulla and Carlini and Detective Sergeant Roger Brown pulled on protective footwear over their shoes and entered the residence. During their initial run-through, they noticed that the garage door was off its track. They did not know whether this was something new or had been that way for a while.

  Given that it looked to be a very complex crime scene, Agents Lulla and Carlini requested that BCI&I Special Agent Gary Wilgus join them to do any blood-spatter analysis. Wilgus, however, told them he couldn’t make it there until the next day, so the two other agents decided to start doing some of the processing before he arrived.

  In the initial walk-through, Agents Lulla and Carlini noted “a remarkable amount of blood in three separate areas of the house, each [of] which led to the main bathroom of the house. In the bathroom were large stains and a bathtub and shower wall covered in suspected blood.”

  Both Agent Lulla and Carlini worked until 4:00 AM, November 12. Because of the very late hour, it was decided that the residence would be secured by KCSO, and the BCI&I agents would return again later in the day.

  * * *

  When he returned to his house following the incident with Deputy Aaron Phillips at the Kokosing Gap Trail parking lot, Matt Hoffman made sure that the girl was tied up on the bed of leaves in the basement and then decided to drink a bottle of wine and burn some incriminating evidence. He started a bonfire in his backyard and threw his shoes into the flames. This didn’t seem to concern his neighbors, since they were used to him doing odd things at all hours of the day and night. Hoffman made sure that the shoes burned down to ash. He wasn’t worried about the girl in his house—she was tied up and gagged. He then slept for a couple of hours and woke around midnight. Before he left, he went down to the basement and looked at the girl again. He didn’t say anything, just stared at her.

  In the early hours of Friday, November 12, Hoffman decided to go back to the woods near Tina’s house, the same woods where he had spent the night of November 9. He’d left items there he now needed to collect before the police found them. He also wanted to see what kind of police activity was going on at the residence on King Beach Drive.

  Hoffman drove to a parking lot at Millwood and then rode his bike to a hill near Apple Valley Lake. From there he left his bike and slowly made his way on foot to the woods near Tina’s residence. It was miles away, and once again this took a lot of time.

  When he arrived, in the darkness of the early morning hours, Hoffman noticed the crime scene tape around the house and the police working, both inside and out. Hoffman spent awhile in the woods, watching. In some ways he liked this—seeing what they were doing and not being seen. The police seemed to have no idea he was down there spying on them. Hoffman got a kick spying on people—he had often done so from up in the branches of a tree on his property,

  After quite a while of watching, Hoffman gathered up a few of his things before making his way back, on foot, to his bike and then backtracking to his car. Authorities would learn later just what he took from the woods—a baseball cap and a knife—and what he left behind. And as with much of what Hoffman did, none of it would make much sense to other people. The walk to his bicycle took quite a long time, and it was about 9:00 AM when he got home, once again exhausted from all his nocturnal activities.

  * * *

  Sarah, left in her cold dark dungeon on the bed of leaves, was fairly certain that her captor was gone once again
. But he had told her that someone else would be watching the house whenever he wasn’t there. And besides, what could she do? She was tied to the primitive frame of the bed of leaves.

  Sarah believed Hoffman was telling the truth about an accomplice. How else could he have moved so many vehicles around by himself? And how had he gotten to her house in the first place, if someone had not dropped him off there? Obviously he had driven Stephanie’s Jeep away from the house, with her in it, and she had even seen the silver car he’d approached, parked at the Pipesville Road baseball fields.

  Sarah decided not to cause any waves. If someone was indeed watching the place, she didn’t want anything bad reported back to her assailant. It was best to do just what he said. It was her best insurance of survival.

  TWELVE

  A Scene of Horror

  Special Agent Gary Wilgus of BCI&I met with Agents Ed Lulla and Ed Carlini at Tina’s residence at 1:00 PM on Friday, November 12, 2010. Sheriff David Barber was there also, along with Detective Sergeant Roger Brown and several deputies who were securing the scene. The BCI&I agents and Detective Sergeant Brown put protective coverings over their shoes and entered the house.

  Wilgus was briefed by the other agents, and his job would now be to examine the blood-spatter patterns while Agents Lulla and Carlini processed Stephanie Sprang’s Jeep Cherokee, which was still parked in the garage.

  Agent Wilgus was a bloodstain expert, and early in his report he defined the terms he would be using to describe his findings. A “bloodstain” was a deposit of blood on a surface. An “altered stain” was a bloodstain with characteristics that indicated a physical change had occurred. A “blood drop” was a volume of blood of sufficient weight to overcome its surface tension and fall free from the mass of blood from which it was formed.