Local crime stories go on Internet

JACKSON, Mo. -- As the result of a New Year's resolution and a love of writing, the story of Cape Girardeau County's major case squad is now available online and in the local library.

Cape Girardeau County Prosecuting Attorney Morley Swingle said at one time he imagined writing the story of the major case squad one day after he retired.

"But then I thought, 'I may stay in the courtroom until I keel over,'" he said. So he made a New Year's resolution to start writing.

And when the county's presiding commissioner asked each officeholder in the county to develop a Web page, Swingle thought of a venue for the story.

And the 29-case history of the major case squad is a story worth telling, Swingle said. Since its inception in 1983, the organization has solved 26 of 28 cases -- a 92.9 percent success rate. The 29th case turned out to be outside the squad's jurisdiction.

Law enforcement officials from Cape Girardeau and Jackson police departments, the sheriff's department and the state highway patrol formed the original group. In 1986, the Bollinger County sheriff's department joined; in 1988, Southeast Missouri State University's department of public safety was added.

Matter of manpower

Swingle said the more investigators working together to solve a case, the more quickly it will get results.

A small agency with just a couple of investigators only has the manpower to check the most obvious leads quickly. When 20 to 30 experienced investigators are available to check leads the results are swift and thorough, he said.

Take the squad's first job, "The Case of the Spent Shell Casings," in which a Wisconsin truck driver was found shot to death in woods along Interstate 55:

While other investigators determined who the victim was, where his truck was and who had last seen him alive, two investigators were looking at four Norma brand shell casings recovered from the scene.

Learning that the brand was only sold at two stores in the state, investigators Jim Keathley and Curt Casteel were able to focus their search on a Fenton store's records and found their killer, who had bought the ammunition three days before the murder.

Keeping sharp

An added benefit is the squad keeps participating investigators sharp through training and the expectation that they could be called to duty at any time.

Swingle used Boulder, Colo., as an example of what can happen when investigators who rarely see major crimes are suddenly faced with a homicide.

The case of Jon Benet Ramsey "was badly bungled," Swingle said, referring to a case in which a young murder victim was suspected of being killed by her parents.

Overwhelmed, investigators made several mistakes, such as letting the suspects walk around the crime scene and not separating them before interviewing them.

"You won't see that happen in our county," Swingle said.

Blaze of glory

One case in particular stands out for Swingle, that of Russell Bucklew.

"That involved probably the most evil and dangerous person I've ever prosecuted," Swingle said.

In a chapter dubbed "The Case of the Man Who Went Down in a Blaze of Glory," Swingle describes a stalker who terrorized his former girlfriend then shot and killed her new boyfriend in front of four children. He then kidnapped the woman, beat, raped and shot her in the leg. She lived to tell police the whole story.

At one point, Bucklew bragged to his victim that he would live out Bon Jovi's song "Blaze of Glory," and die in a shootout with police.

In June 1996, three months after he was caught, he escaped from the Cape Girardeau County Jail and attacked members of the woman's family.

Bucklew was caught again and eventually convicted of first-degree murder, forcible rape, kidnapping, burglary and armed criminal action.

He has been sentenced to death and awaits execution.

Because he's been involved with the squad as a prosecutor since the beginning, Swingle was in the perfect position to chronicle its results.

"The Story of the Major Case Squad" was posted to the Web site this month. So far, the only feedback Swingle has received has been from major case squad members -- thanking him for the effort -- and his mother's bridge club -- pointing out grammatical and spelling errors.

"There's a lot of retired teachers in that group," Swingle said.

An English major in college with an emphasis in creative writing, Swingle writes for fun in his spare time. He's published more than 20 articles and book chapters in legal publications. He has been working on a historical novel since 1980 and is putting the finishing touches on it now.

abuchanan@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 160