05x12 - Foundation of Lies

[bunniefuu]

Narrator: at the age of ,

This young man's testimony

Helped convict the man who m*rder*d his mother.

Years later,

Discrepancies in the autopsy led him to question

If the m*rder*d woman really was his mother.

If it wasn't,

An innocent man had been sent to prison.

This well-manicured neighborhood in mansfield, ohio,

Was home to one of the most successful doctors in town.

Dr. John boyle,

Known as "jack" to family and friends,

Had built up a thriving medical practice in mansfield

That was the envy of his colleagues.

Man: he had what the investigators called

The largest medical practice in richland county.

Uh, one out of people--

And we have , people living in richland county--

Used dr. Boyle as their physician.

Narrator: jack and his wife noreen

Had been married for more than years.

Noreen enjoyed the status they had achieved in the community.

Woman: she was one who liked to,

Kind of, maybe put on some airs,

And she was very interested in social status

And, I think, was concerned

About what people thought of her.

Narrator: the couple had two children,

A -year-old son collier,

And a /-year-old daughter elizabeth,

Whom they adopted from taiwan.

From outward appearances,

They appeared to be a happy family,

But jack boyle had a not-so-well-kept secret.

Jack was having numerous sexual affairs

With other women.

Noreen knew about jack's affairs

But, according to friends, looked the other way

In an effort to keep the family together,

But it wasn't long until collier was old enough

To figure things out for himself...

Especially after seeing his father

Kiss another woman romantically.

For noreen, this was the last straw,

And she filed for divorce.

Jack boyle had been planning to move his medical practice

To erie, pennsylvania, about hours away.

He asked noreen to join him there

To make a fresh start.

On new year's day in ,

Noreen boyle missed a lunch date

With her best friend,

Who called police to report her missing.

Man: collier, did you hear anything the other night?

Well...

I heard mom and dad arguing.

Narrator: collier boyle and his grandmother told investigators

That noreen and jack had an argument on new year's eve

And that noreen left home after the argument.

Noreen: we are getting divorced.

We'll work out something, anything.

Man: so if you looked at the actual circumstances,

They were believable.

The fact that she walked out the door,

She was very upset.

Um, I don't know whether another issue may have come up,

Maybe another girlfriend or something like that

And would have caused her to just up and leave,

And that's not beyond belief.

It's not even unusual in our business.

Ma'am, can you tell me where dr. Boyle is?

Jack left for erie in the morning.

Do you know what he's doing there?

Narrator: dr. Boyle's mother said

Jack left after breakfast for erie, pennsylvania,

To work on the new home he had purchased.

Noreen boyle's friends were suspicious.

They doubted that noreen would ever leave home

Without her children.

But dr. Boyle had no history of domestic v*olence,

And his mother said she heard nothing unusual or suspicious

On the night noreen disappeared.

Days passed.

There was no word from noreen boyle.

People in mansfield wondered if she'd left town

To get away from her husband's infidelities

Or if she was a victim of foul play.

Narrator: in january of , noreen boyle,

The pretty -year-old wife of a prominent physician in mansfield, ohio,

Had been reported missing.

There is no way. The children...

Family members said the couple argued

On new year's eve,

And jack said noreen left the home after the argument.

But a neighbor who was awake that night

Said he didn't see anyone leave the boyle residence

Between midnight and : in the morning.

Police searched the boyles' home,

Looking for evidence of v*olence.

Man: when we arrived on hawthorne lane,

We were fully-staffed.

We had lab coats.

We went in to process the scene

For the potential evidence of maybe a homicide happened,

And when we got done,

We pretty much just shrugged our shoulders and left.

Narrator: the day after noreen disappeared,

Jack boyle had driven to erie, pennsylvania,

Where he had planned to move his medical practice.

When police looked into the couple's background,

They discovered that jack boyle was a serial philanderer

Who had a number of extramarital relationships

Which were known to the entire family.

Jack: you had enough, huh? Yeah.

Narrator: in one instance,

Collier saw his father kiss and hug a woman named sherri campbell,

Whom he introduced as his "good friend."

Collier, this is sherri.

Hi. Nice to meet you. How are you?

One of daddy's friends.

Good. How are you?

Narrator: what caught collier's attention

Was that sherri campbell was wearing a ring

That belonged to his mother.

Mayer: that's a low-life type of thing,

Was to take his wife's, uh, jewelry--

Steal it from his wife--

And then place it on his mistress' finger

And acted like he bought that ring

Specifically for sherri campbell.

Narrator: just weeks before noreen boyle disappeared,

The couple had purchased a new home

In erie, pennsylvania,

But the signature on the purchase agreement

Was that of "n. Sherry boyle,"

Which was not noreen's middle name,

And the description given by the real estate agent

Did not match noreen boyle.

Messmore: the real estate agent described the young lady

That was with dr. Boyle

As being pregnant and very young,

And certainly that didn't resemble the photos

That I had of noreen,

Who was a little bit older

And a blonde-haired, attractive woman.

Narrator: also suspicious

Was that jack boyle didn't negotiate the sales price.

He agreed to pay the full asking price

In exchange for the seller's promise

To be out of the home by january .

David messmore suspected

That boyle may have had a specific reason

Why he wanted to have possession of the erie home

By january

And why he was making frequent trips there

Following his wife's disappearance.

Messmore took a calculated risk

And visited collier boyle at school

So he could speak to the boy alone.

Collier, is there anything more you can tell me

About the fight you heard

Between your parents the other night?

Well....

I heard a big thump

Coming from my parents' room.

Narrator: collier was even more forthcoming

Than he had been in earlier interviews.

Well, my father walked down the hall...

Messmore: collier was awakened by a loud thump.

Shortly after that,

His father--he heard him walking down the hallway

To his room,

And he remembers his father opening the door

And looking in at him for a long period of time.

And did anything happen the next day?

Did he say anything to you the next morning?

Well, he told me mom went on a little vacation.

Narrator: and collier had more information

About his father's trips to erie.

Messmore: collier also told me

That after his father got back from that weekend in erie,

His shoulders and arms were very sore

And collier had to rub liniment on him,

Which was unusual.

Narrator: a check of local businesses

Revealed jack boyle had rented a jackhammer

From the eze rental center in mansfield

A few days before noreen disappeared

And had also purchased a roll of indoor-outdoor carpet.

The realtor who sold dr. Boyle his new home

Told investigators that he asked some unusual questions

About the property.

Messmore: he said that "is there a chance

"That I could lower the floor in the basement

Because my kids like to play basketball downstairs."

So when we put together those two pieces of evidence

That he wanted to lower the basement floor

And he rented a jackhammer

And his wife was missing...

Narrator: investigators suspected

That it was dr. Boyle's mistress,

Sherri campbell,

Who signed noreen boyle's name to the sales agreement

And that sherri campbell was pregnant

With jack boyle's baby.

Agent: congratulations.

Campbell: thank you.

Narrator: the next step

Was to look inside dr. Boyle's new home.

Narrator: just over weeks after noreen boyle disappeared,

Police got a search warrant for jack boyle's new home

In erie, pennsylvania.

Investigators knew dr. Boyle had rented a jackhammer

A few days before his wife disappeared

And that dr. Boyle had been making almost daily trips to erie

During the weeks his wife had been missing.

This is the police videotape of that search.

In the garage, police found the new green indoor-outdoor carpeting

Jack boyle had recently purchased,

But little else.

From there, police checked the basement.

The floor had recently been painted gray

And new shelves installed at one end.

Messmore: so as the technicians were on the floor

And looking around,

One of them went over to the wall of the concrete, uh,

Block basement and said,

"There's a little bit of new concrete.

"It's like a-- a mortar or something.

It's kind of soft."

And at that point, after we'd knocked down the shelving

And pulled up the indoor-outdoor carpeting,

It was apparent that there was a little depression in the floor.

Narrator: carefully, they dug a small hole.

Police smelled the strong odor of decomposition.

Beneath the freshly poured concrete

Was the nude, badly decomposed body

Of a middle-aged woman,

Her head covered with a plastic bag.

She was wearing an expensive rolex watch

With noreen boyle's initials engraved on the back.

The watch had stopped on december ,

The day noreen boyle disappeared.

To identify the body,

A forensic odontologist compared the victim's teeth

To dental x-rays of noreen boyle.

Tambasco: after he completed his work,

He looked at those, made the comparisons,

And actually, in the morgue, announced,

"This is this person."

He made the identification

That the victim was, in fact, noreen boyle.

Narrator: the autopsy concluded

The noreen boyle was suffocated

After she was struck on the head with a blunt object.

Prosecutors now knew

Why jack boyle wanted to take possession of his new home

Earlier than the sellers originally wanted to vacate.

Mayer: because it was part of the m*rder plot

To k*ll her on the early morning hours of december , ,

And he wanted to have a funeral place for the burial,

And that was this new home that he wanted in

Before, uh, january , .

That was part of the m*rder plan

Or plot or this prior calculation and design.

Narrator: that plan also included

The rental of the jackhammer

And dr. Boyle bringing his mother home

So she could baby-sit while he disposed of the body.

But prosecutors could find no evidence

That the body was transported to erie

In jack boyle's car.

Tambasco: we did vacuum sweepings from all the cars.

We tried to see if there was any association

With the victim in the car

That would not be normal,

And there was really nothing that was drawn

Of any value from the analysis of the bureau.

Narrator: and the plastic bag

Found wrapped around noreen's head

Did not contain any identifiable fingerprints.

A couple of days later,

Investigators found over a ton of concrete chips

In mansfield, ohio,

On a deserted piece of property

Owned by a business associate of dr. Boyle,

Who also happened to be the uncle of sherri campbell,

Dr. Boyle's girlfriend.

Mayer: and it was shaped up like you would put dirt

On top of a burial plot.

It was was actually molded and shaped, this concrete,

As if somebody was buried underneath it.

Narrator: and a witness reported seeing dr. Boyle

In his pickup truck

Near the place where the concrete chips were found.

To find out whether the cement debris

Came from the basement floor in the erie home,

Investigators took samples to larry pishitelli

At ctl engineering.

Pishitelli performed what is called

A "petrographic analysis."

Pishitelli: based on our analysis, we were able to show

That the sample that came out of that pile of concrete debris

In mansfield, ohio,

Matched the sample that came out of the original basement floor slab in erie, pennsylvania,

And therefore, they were both from the same structure.

Narrator: prosecutors believed they had an open-and-shut case

Until a family member delivered a bombshell--

The news that noreen boyle was still alive.

I think I could do that.

Sure. It sounds like a really good idea.

Why don't you send me the information...

Narrator: on the night noreen boyle disappeared,

She was on the telephone with a girlfriend

When her husband jack came home with his mother,

Who was visiting for the holidays.

Well, I guess jack isn't going to m*rder me tonight

Because his mother is spending the night.

Narrator: but prosecutors believe

That was exactly jack's plan--

To m*rder noreen <span tts:fontstyle="italic">that night while his mother <span tts:fontstyle="italic">was there,

So she could baby-sit the children

As he got rid of the body.

Also part of this plan

Was jack taking possession of his new home by january

And the rental of the jackhammer.

Sometime after midnight on new year's day, ,

The boyles argued,

And jack struck his wife on the head in their bedroom.

He tied a plastic bag around her neck,

Wrapped her in a tarpaulin,

And carried the body out to his car.

Then jack looked in on collier

To see if he might have heard anything.

Collier said he pretended to be asleep.

The next morning, boyle drove his wife's body

To his new home in erie, pennsylvania,

Hours away.

Boyle used the jackhammer to dig noreen's grave,

Then filled the hole with newly mixed concrete.

The indoor-outdoor carpeting was placed on top.

He transported the concrete debris back to mansfield

To get rid of the evidence of the burial.

Messmore: I think dr. Boyle was theorizing

That he was going to have a very successful practice,

Was going to make a lot of money in erie, pennsylvania.

He was going to move there,

And he was going to have a girl

That he had had a relationship with

And was about to have a baby with at his side.

He wanted to have his other two children with him,

But he didn't want noreen around,

So, in his mind,

That was a successful conclusion to this whole situation

Is to just remove her from the scene.

I think john boyle is somebody who has himself convinced

He didn't do this,

But I think that he's a pathological liar.

I think that he had lied to people throughout his life.

He lied to his wife about his girlfriends.

He lied to his girlfriends about his other girlfriends.

He lied to people about his military experience.

Um, I think he was such a good liar,

He believed those lies.

Narrator: dr. Jack boyle was charged with first-degree m*rder

In the death of his wife,

And the key witness against him was his own son,

Who told jurors of his father's infidelities.

Collier: I told her, I said,

"Mom, please sit down."

She says, "why, collier?"

I said, "just please sit down.

There's something I have to tell you."

And she said, "ok."

And I said, "I think daddy has a girlfriend."

And then she said,

"Well, collier, that's impossible.

He can't have a girlfriend."

And I explained to her that daddy had kissed her

And hugged her and stuff like that,

And I admitted to my mother that I did,

And she said, "that's ok."

She said I knew I was in an impossible position.

Narrator: collier also told the jury

What he heard from his parents' bedroom

On the night his mother disappeared.

Collier: I heard a thud, a little--

Man: could you describe this sound for us?

Ok. It was about this loud.

[Thud]

And then about a minute and a half later,

I heard--or, I mean, half a minute later--

I heard, um, a thud like this.

[Louder thud]

It was even louder.

And at that time, I was petrified.

I mean, I was just scared.

Man: we, the jury in this case, find...

Narrator: the jury found dr. Boyle guilty

And sentenced him to life in prison

Without possibility of parole for years.

But the story doesn't end there.

After the trial,

Jack boyle's brother said noreen boyle had called him

On january , ,

Two days after her supposed m*rder.

He said he wanted to testify at the trial

But had not been called.

Maintaining his innocence from his prison cell,

Jack boyle also contended

That the coroner had misidentified the victim.

Boyle: there certainly are discrepancies

That warrant a review of the autopsy--

A very careful review of the autopsy,

In particular because of the capital case.

It's my personal opinion that the body is not that of noreen.

Narrator: to back up his claims,

He pointed out discrepancies in the autopsy,

Which describe the body in the basement as having

The wrong eye color,

The wrong height,

The wrong weight,

Described the victim as having no gallbladder

And with an intact appendix.

Boyle: noreen had an appendectomy.

Appendices do not grow after they're removed.

It just doesn't happen physiologically.

Narrator: joining him in the request for exhumation

Was his son collier,

Who, by this time, was years old.

He, too, was concerned about the discrepancies in the autopsy.

Now, almost years later,

He wanted to make sure it was his mother's body

Police found in the basement.

The body was exhumed

And tested using a mitochondrial dna analysis,

Which confirmed what the prosecution always contended--

The body was that of noreen boyle.

Mayer: that was where he tried to poke a hole--

And a major hole--

In the prosecution's case,

But forensic evidence actually backfired on him

And showed conclusively that it was, in fact, noreen boyle.

Narrator: the autopsy report did contain some factual errors,

But in the end, dna testing left no doubt

And provided some closure for collier boyle--

Scientific proof that his suspicions

On the night his mother disappeared

Were, unfortunately, correct.

Messmore: well, I don't think there's ever any way

To erase the hurt that's inside him.

To have your father k*ll your mother,

Um, is probably the most devastating thing that could ever happen to you,

And so I think he's always going to suffer with that

Until, uh, hopefully time heals that

And, uh, and, uh...

Maybe puts that in the back of his mind

Instead of the forefront.