"Domestic Terrorism"

The following is a copy, slightly edited, of a statement that my adult daughter, who lives with me, recently submitted to law enforcement.  The incidents described here took place on February 27th and February 28th of this year.  As of yet, she has had no response from San Antonio, state, or federal LE agencies of any kind.

I am [name, age,address, and contact info. omitted].  I am a self-employed professional free-lance artist with a degree in illustration from [a major East Coast art college].  I live with my mother [name omitted], who is a long-time stalking victim of her ex-husband and my father [name omitted] and numerous relatives and associates of his.  After I willingly provided samples of my DNA to two different law enforcement agencies for filial analysis with regard to investigations involving my father a few years ago, I too became a victim of organized stalking and harassment.

I decided to drive from my home in Fredericksburg to San Antonio for the day on 2/28/2017, for a combination of work and pleasure.  I left my house around 8 AM, driving south and east on first Hwy 87 and then I-10.  At the time I left, I was already frightened and upset because of an incident that had occurred the previous day at the Whataburger restaurant in Fredericksburg, when I'd gone there for lunch around 11:30 AM and an elderly white male with glasses had come up to me, glared at me, and then started reaching for a very large knife that he had sticking up out of his back pocket so he was certain I'd seen it.

As soon as I turned onto Hwy 87, I noticed that I was being followed and tailgated by numerous vehicles of all sorts.  Many of these were weaving dangerously in and out of traffic.  This continued for my entire trip to San Antonio, and the speeds involved in this on I-10, plus the fact that I drive a very small car, made the trip particularly frightening.  Along the way, I saw numerous marked police vehicles of various sorts and entities parked along the sides of the roads.  Uniformed officers in these vehicles had to have seen what was going on, but none of them did anything at all to help me.

In San Antonio, I exited I-10 at the Fredericksburg Road exit.  As I did so, two mid-sized SUVs, one white and one very light silver, tried to run my car off the road. [Note that my car is also white.]  A third vehicle, a black car, attempted to do the same, but failed.  This happened around 9 AM and should be clearly visible on any surveillance cameras in the area.

Around 11 AM in the area around the Witte Museum, a skinheaded white or Hispanic male began tailgating my car very aggressively in a red pickup truck.  When I turned onto a side street, he followed me and then pulled up right behind me and glared at me angrily.

Later, I went to Crossroads Mall.  As I started walking toward Target around 1:30 PM, I realized that I was being followed by a very thin white male, over 6 feet tall, with dark or tanned skin, quick/athletic, and wearing glasses, a white hat, and a brown poofy wig.  This man kept getting closer and closer to me, and as he got nearer, I felt threatened and sped up in an effort to get away from him.  I hurried toward Target, because there was no one around in the parking lot to help me; as I sped up, he did as well.  This was absolutely terrifying.  The man was right behind me when I entered Target, but when I turned to the right a short distance inside, I saw him hurry off heading straight into the store.

My drive home was the same as my drive down:  same route, same problems with being aggressively tailgated and driven around at high rates of speed, etc.  And once again, I saw numerous marked police vehicles parked along the roadsides doing nothing to stop the dangerous drivers, even when they were clearly tailgating me, changing lanes without signaling, not bearing legal license plates (many had no plates at all), etc.

I was so shaken with fear by the time I got home that I was uncertain about what I should do.  I did almost immediately sit down and draw the man who chased me through the parking lot, since I'd had no chance to photograph him.  I am good at drawing faces, so I drew him without the wig and hat to show his facial structure.  Both of us should be easily visible on cameras in the mall parking lot.

I have finally calmed down enough to be able to report what happened yesterday.  I expect the San Antonio Police Department, the Texas DPS, and any other law enforcement entities with jurisdiction to investigate what was done to me very thoroughly.  I am also providing copies of this statement of mine to the LE agencies that I provided DNA samples to, and I am sending copies to the FBI and the DOJ/  I will be happy to answer any and all questions anyone might have to the best of my ability. 

My daughter insists on calling what is being done to her domestic terrorism.  I'm not sure I can go that far, but I can certainly understand her being able to make a case for this. Certainly, these incidents are classic organized stalking.

Besides the obvious threats to my daughter's safety, I hope readers from outside this area will begin to grasp the sheer extent and magnitude of the lawlessness that exists here, because I realize how hard it is to wrap your head around this until you actually see and experience it. Situations and conditions like this simply can't exist unless there is a total lack of functioning law enforcement!

Coincidentally (???), I have become aware that there have been major recent developments in both of the homicide cases that my daughter provided evidence for.

By the way, I immediately recognized both of the men in my daughter's drawings below.  The first is a close associate of my ex-husband's who has been involved in stalking incidents with me numerous times going back to 1999.  The second is a man who has also been involved in many stalking incidents targeting me, including some where he followed me out-of-state;  I believe him to be a professional (=hired) stalker.  If he is the man I believe him to be, his natural hair color is light sandy/red.

 

Drawing of the man with the knife at Whataburger:

Drawing of the man at Target:

Dead On The Roadside 2013

White Lincoln Town Cars

As I was driving on I-10 recently in heavy traffic that was moving well, someone in a dark pickup pulled up next to me, to my left and slightly in front of me, and suddenly threw a square black metal object directly at my vehicle very hard. This object just missed hitting my vehicle, and I heard it hit the road and go flying off somewhere. I never saw who was in the truck the object came from, and I never saw anyone reach out to throw it; all I saw was a distinctive-looking black metal square come flying toward me. In describing this square to others later, I learned that it was probably a plate that goes on the bottom of a scaffolding pole or on top of a builder's screw jack.

Then, on the morning after Thanksgiving (11/25/11) at around 9:45 AM, I had just entered I-10 at the La Cantera entrance ramp heading west in heavy traffic that was again moving well, when a white Lincoln Town car came speeding up, pulled in behind me, and began tailgating me. About a minute later, this car abruptly pulled into the lane just to my left and came speeding past me, going very fast. As it passed by me, I tried to see who was inside, but the windows of this vehicle looked almost as white as the car, as if they were frosted, and it was impossible to see anything inside.

The white Lincoln then cut in front of me and began driving directly ahead of my vehicle in the same lane. It began swerving back and forth a bit, so I tried to make out the license plate, but I couldn't see it well and couldn't make any of it out; in retrospect, I believe it was either a temporary tag or was obscured by a plastic cover.

Then all of a sudden, a light tan piece of what looked like wood came flying directly at me and very hard from the passenger side of the Lincoln. By some miracle, the wood fell just short of the front of my vehicle, missing it by a foot or less. I both saw and heard the projectile hit the road very hard, and I saw it bounce off the pavement and go flying fairly high up into the air before coming back down and sliding off the righthand side of the road. Once again, I had not seen an arm reach out to throw the object; I'd only seen it hurtling straight at me.

This second object had a square shape, size, and thickness that were all very similar to the black metal one from the previous incident, but it was even stranger and more distinctive-looking to me than the first. Although it had looked like it was made of light-colored wood, each of its four corners had a small diagonal line running across them that looked, in the split-second glance I had at them, like each corner had a small, sharp cover over it. I'm pretty sure these covers were metal, because they were shiny gray in color, and I thought I could see small sparks as the corners hit the pavement and bounced off. I'm less certain that the body of the square projectile was actually made of wood as it appeared, since the tan square seemed a bit heavier than I'd have expected and had made a sort of brittle noise when it bounced.

Besides the surprise of having these items come suddenly flying at me, the other thing I remember most about both incidents is how hard they had to have been thrown at me. In thinking about what I saw (and didn't see), and in discussing the incidents with others, I've come to the conclusion that these objects were probably launched at me mechanically somehow, rather than having been thrown by a person. This could have been done by something like a clay pigeon throwing device used for shooting skeet, or by using some sort of combination of a rail and surgical tubing. But again, I never saw anything like this protruding from either of these vehicles, either, although to be honest, I wasn't exactly looking for them at the time.

As soon as the wooden? object bounced away, the Lincoln immediately sped off down the freeway, going very fast (well over the speed limit) and still weaving slightly. As you can imagine, I was fairly shaken up by both incidents, particularly the second one, since that projectile had come much closer to hitting me and had been aimed straight at my head when it first came flying at me.

The other thing that shook me up badly about the second incident was that both LBJ and my former mother-in-law used to be famous for driving around our small town in white Lincoln Town cars, although they of course were older models than the one I had the incident with. (This is the reason the title of this post is plural, not singular.) My former father-in-law and his father were close business associates of LBJ's, and my ex-'s mother never made any secret of the fact that she enjoyed driving a car just like Johnson's.

I believe both of these incidents, and particularly the second one, were attempts on my life. The first I thought might possibly have been an accident at the time, but the second was clearly a serious attempt to injure or kill me, either by hitting me in the head or making me swerve, causing me to hit someone or something. Worse, these attempts aimed at me might have also hurt or killed someone else who happened to be driving nearby me.

I have reported the second incident to the Texas Department of Public Safety by email but have not yet had a response and have not yet had time to talk to anyone there. I doubt there are many white Lincoln Town cars owned by people living in our area, so I'd appreciate any information on them that my readers might be able to email me through this blog (anonymously is fine) or post as a comment here.

Before I end this post, there's one more thing I need to add. I'm currently working for a national company whose name you would immediately recognize, and as part of my on-boarding paperwork when I signed on with them, they required me to sign off on a vaguely worded life insurance document that said it covered me while I travel to and from work with them. And sure enough, I was indeed either heading to or from my work with them when each of these projectile attacks against me took place.

Dumped

Interstate 10 passes through only a small corner of Gillespie County--yet that's where this murder victim's body was dumped.

The Case Of The Dropped Driver's License

How many killers do you know of that conveniently leave their driver's license AND a current photo of themselves by their victims?

This case rocked the Comfort area in 2003. As you read these accounts, notice how the officials' positions change. Keep in mind that property along I-10 in this area is extremely valuable and greatly desired by developers, particularly if it's scenic (because it makes for great subdivisions). Property close to all of I-10 is also often used by drug smugglers (see for example my post "Letter To The Editor" from 6/14/10).

My former father-in-law's stepmother was from Comfort. During the years I was married, my husband's family owned a ranch in this same area; I don't know if they still own it or not. Certainly they and their associates are some of the people most interested in real estate for development in this area.

Finally, there have been a large number of suspicious deaths in this same area over the last ten years or more. Many of these are discussed in my 9/3/09 post here entitled "I-10 At Comfort". One of those who died here was a state trooper said to be on some sort of "special task force".

Update, 4/11: I believe this property is now being developed for commercial use.

Coincidences

A small article in the 7/13/10 edition of the San Antonio Express-News announced a guilty plea in the murder of Donald H. Althaus that occurred on 1/22/09 in San Antonio. (I discussed this case here previously in a post from 8/23/09 that is followed by a comment by my ex-husband.) Coincidentally, the middle name of the man who admitted committing the crime is a very prominent name in my ex-husband's family. Also, the mother of the accused apparently is involved in the case.

There are also some interesting coincidences concerning another old murder case. In August of 2007, a man named Kenneth Polan was said to have been murdered near I-10 and 1604 (i.e., northwest of San Antonio) at a trailer sales business owned by a couple having the same last name as close friends of my former in-laws. Polan's body was found later in a river south of San Antonio, and a man was charged with the crime. One night while watching television newscast coverage of this case, my children and I saw news footage of a very distinctive Suburban with unusual coloring and markings being towed to the crime lab for forensic examination. We instantly recognized this vehicle as looking identical to one owned by my former brother-in-law and his wife. News reports said the case was an extremely complicated one and involved multiple jurisdictions, but no additional information was ever given out and I have never seen any updates or status reports on this case. Coincidentally, a few months after this, my kids said their aunt and uncle told them they had sold this vehicle. We continued to see them and various family members and associates of theirs driving this Suburban, however, so we weren't sure they'd really sold it. A few days ago, we spotted it parked next to my former brother-in-law's wife's workplace with a "For Sale" sign in the window.

After my husband suddenly left in 1999, people around town began telling me he was a close associate of a man here who's a member of an extremely wealthy West Coast family with extensive media holdings, a fact my husband had apparently concealed from me. Coincidentally, this man also filed for divorce from his wife around the same time my husband left and filed. This man's children, who happen to be around the same age as mine, almost immediately became some of our worst and most long-time harassers, and they continue to stalk and harass us to this day.

Finally, although a recent pair of local shooting deaths made me suspect coincidences, not enough information has come out yet for me to know for sure. I first learned of these deaths when I turned on the 6 PM news just after it had started and was shocked to see the San Antonio reporter standing in front of our small-town law enforcement building with the word "Suicide" written in large letters below her. The story ended before I heard any of it, so I tried other stations, but no one else seemed to be carrying the story, which I thought was odd for what had been a lead story on the first network's newscast. Immediately afterward, I turned the t.v. to our local station to catch the story on the local news-radio channel--and was shocked to discover music playing instead and the announcer making no mention of the missing newscast and acting as if nothing was wrong!

That night at 10 PM, I watched the entire newscast on the channel where I'd caught the end of the story originally, but this time they never mentioned it. There was nothing in the newspaper the next morning, so I was mystified as to what had happened to what I knew had been a lead story the night before. I saw no mention of the story on the noon news from either San Antonio or Austin.

That night on the 10 PM news on the station originally carrying the story, I finally found out what had happened: a married couple and their pet dog had been found shot to death in their home out in the country here. I did not recognize the couple's last name and did not believe at the time that I knew them. I was very surprised to hear the reporter say the deaths had been ruled a murder-suicide by the police, both because of the "Suicide" label used by itself the previous night and also the fact that normally such a story would be front-page news.

The San Antonio newspaper finally ran one of their little "mini-articles" on the deaths the next day. Our local paper carried only a very brief article about the deaths containing little additional information.

According to the newspaper accounts, the wife was the same age as my ex-husband. I've been watching for obituaries for the couple to find out who they were related to, her maiden name, and where she went to high school. If she's the person I now believe she might be, she's very closely connected to my ex-husband and there are some very interesting coincidences indeed. I'll post an update here when I get more information.

7/25/10: Here's the promised update. I finally saw an obituary for the wife, and she's not the person I was afraid she might be. Coincidentally, however, she has ties to the equestrian world, as did Dana Edwards, a local woman who was murdered in San Antonio, who had harassed us, and whose family may have owned property near ours. (I've discussed this death previously in an earlier post here. In "My Story" at the beginning of this blog, I've also discussed the fact that my first cousin is very well-known in the equestrian world and that I have good reasons for believing my ex-husband married me in order to make certain "business connections" to my cousin and his wealthy jet-setting friends.)

And Automobiles...

I've already discussed the subject of automobiles around here: see "To The Beach And Back Again" (3/16/10) and "Winter Texans" (3/26/10), for example. There is a great deal more to discuss on the subject that I'll almost certainly tackle in the future, too, but today I intend to blog about an aspect of automobiles that is very fresh in my mind and also very representative of some of the many ways people are victimized around here.

First I need to back-track a little. Almost 2 weeks ago, I drove my youngest child to the "big city" (San Antonio, about an hour's drive from where we live) to place an order for a medical-related item from a company recommended by our doctor. At the time we placed the order, I thought the cost seemed unusually high, but I was not completely familiar with what was being ordered, the doctor had recommended this company very highly to us, and my ex-husband usually reimburses me for similar items for the kids, so I went ahead and placed the order. We explained that we also needed to receive our item as quickly as possible, and the salesperson told us they would put a "rush" on it.

Although I'd already paid for our order in full, I decided to wait on submitting the receipt to my ex-husband for reimbursement until we had the order and I was sure it was right. However, a few days later, I received a letter from my ex- indicating he somehow knew I'd placed the order and implying I'd paid too much for it. I did a little checking and did indeed discover that the company had probably overcharged me by a substantial amount. (This is done to me frequently here where we live, but usually not in San Antonio.)

When we didn't hear anything from the company, I began calling them. Each time I called, I was put on hold while they did some sort of checking and then was told our order wasn't there yet. Today I was finally told we could come to pick it up, so my youngest and I got into our car and headed down. Because we rarely go to the "big city", we always try to combine errands there, so we had other stops to make as well.

As we were driving down, I noticed we were being passed by an unusually large number of vehicles from our town (ones with local stickers and logos on them). As we neared the city, my youngest and I decided it would be more efficient to do one of our other errands first. As we got out of our car, I noticed a woman wearing a pink T-shirt with a logo from our home area jump out of a vehicle that had parked nearby. The woman walked directly in front of our vehicle with a cigarette dangling from her lips and then stopped until she was sure we'd noticed her; then she hurried off and we went inside to complete our first errand.

Our next stop was at the business where we picked up our order--and where we noticed a number of people hanging around who did not seem to be doing anything in particular. We were pleased with our purchase (except for the price), and we decided it had been worth waiting for.

After that, my youngest and I decided to have lunch at a nearby restaurant from a major chain. We waited a few minutes to be seated--and then discovered to our dismay that our waitress was very seriously and visibly impaired (high on crack, if I had to guess). We watched in horror as she lost her balance while walking and fell against a wall. She clearly could not handle a large, heavy tray, and other servers brought our food and filled our water glasses. However, the impaired waitress continued hovering over us and constantly bothering us about trivial things in an obnoxious manner. By the end of our meal, we saw her nearly fall again, and we'd reached the point where we just wanted to get away from her. As we were leaving, the hostess asked us if we'd enjoyed our meal--and then started laughing at us!

We made a few more stops (and saw more vehicles and people from home) and then headed for a store we'd planned as our last stop. As we walked in, we discovered my ex-husband and his wife waiting for us just inside the door. His wife walked up next to me to make sure I'd seen her and then hurried away. My ex- walked up to our youngest and spoke with them briefly (also to let us know he was there). My youngest and I discovered the store didn't have what we wanted, so we decided to try one more store before heading home.

We then found what we needed and started back on the interstate. It didn't take long for us to realize that a woman in a gold car was tailgating us with her headlights on. She did this for about 20 miles or so and refused to pass us despite many opportunities to do so. When she finally sped off, she also switched her lights off. Several other vehicles also tailgated us with their lights on for various lengths of time.

Now that I've detailed things for you, let me explain more fully what was going on. The owners of the 70+-year-old company that was recommended to us have ties to our area, own land here, and know my ex-husband and his family well. No doubt we were told our order wasn't ready for several days in order to get us to drive to San Antonio on a day my ex-husband had off. We were followed and under illegal surveillance the entire time we were gone, probably by associates of my ex-. The business probably overcharged me and certainly violated our privacy by disclosing our order to my ex-husband without permission. (The letter my ex- sent me implies that he intends to blame me for being overcharged.) We were harassed by an obvious doper working at the restaurant (there's no way this woman could pass a drug test!), and other employees thought it was funny. My ex-husband and his wife then staged the meeting at the store (because it's no fun stalking someone if you don't let them know at some point who's behind it). Finally, we were "harassed by auto" going home.

These events form a variation on the themes of stalking, harassment, and illegal surveillance perpetrated against us every time we go anywhere--and we've been victims of this for at least 10 years and almost certainly much longer. Some parts are the same virtually every time: the locals following us; harassment by both employees and customers in various businesses; my ex- and/or someone very close to him turning up briefly at some point; and the automotive harassment (tailgating, flashing light, reckless driving around us, etc.). Some aspects differ from time to time, though; for example, sometimes marked law enforcement vehicles (from multiple jurisdictions) are involved in harassing incidents directed at us. In one particularly memorable incident when I was coming home after picking up one of my kids at the airport, one of the vehicles tailgating us and then speeding off was a very large, bright red SUV with a custom lt. governor's license plate. (The white pickup that immediately took its place tailgating us that day was being driven by my ex-husband with his wife in the front passenger seat. My ex- was shaking his head "no" back and forth in a bizarre, exaggerated fashion.)

The G-Man Down The Road

The former FBI agent working as a private investigator and certified fraud investigator who defrauded me in 2005 (see my 9/16/09 post entitled "They Said") once insisted that I meet with him in his home in a nice subdivision just off I-10 near Boerne. (Much later, a DPS senior investigator told me p.i.s are not supposed to do this.) At his house, I met his wife, whom he said worked for him, as did their adult children.

While I was there, the former FBI agent showed me his gun and badge, which were in a glass case. Nearly, I noticed a distinctive framed art print that appeared to be either very similar or identical to one I'd remembered seeing on the wall of the FBI agent who lived next door to my father and stepmother (see "The G-Man Next Door" below). I was surprised to see a copy of this print in Texas, because I associated the artist (who has a very distinctive style and was a friend of my late mother's) more with the state my father lives in.

Several times during this and subsequent meetings with this man, he mentioned that his wife had been a high school classmate of a very prominent San Antonio attorney. (I later learned this attorney is a major criminal defense lawyer.) The former agent also told me (but always verbally, never in writing) on several different occasions that another former classmate of his wife's had been an FBI agent and colleague of his but, like him, had retired and become a private investigator. However, he described this former colleague as a "rogue agent" [his exact words] who'd gotten mixed up with a criminal known as "Murph The Surf" who had murdered a woman in Florida. He and the former DEA agent-turned-p.i. who'd recommended I hire him told me on several occasions they had reason to believe my ex-husband was somehow involved with these criminals, but they would not give me any proof or additional information on this, and I didn't know whether to believe them or not.

Also during this and subsequent meetings with the retired agent, he mentioned that he and his wife were involved in some sort of prison ministry that involved regularly visiting inmates on behalf of their church. I'm not familiar with the particular church they belonged to, but over the years, I've noticed that many of the churches here whose finances are handled only by very close associates of my former father-in-law also have these prison ministries. (They have extensive ongoing missionary projects in Mexico and Central America as well that involve frequent member trips to these countries.)

The final thing I need to mention for now about my meetings with this former FBI agent is that twice when I met with him, he was wearing a t-shirt identical to two owned by one of my children. These shirts were very distinctive, and both times I mentioned to the agent that one of my kids owned the same shirt. He just laughed it off as coincidence at the time, but a few weeks after I fired him (see "My Story" at the beginning of this blog), both of these shirts suddenly turned up together in my offspring's overnight bag upon returning from visitation with their dad, and they said they did not know how the shirts got in there. I have been forced to conclude that the ex-agent deliberately wore my child's shirts while meeting with me as a sick joke.

After I accidentally discovered this man was not really working for me and fired him, I began to have serious and repeated problems with him stalking and harassing me (that I have kept records of). One of these incidents occurred while I was driving to San Antonio on I-10 to meet with a lawyer who'd been recommended to me by the State Bar of Texas' referral service. As I passed the entrance ramp located closest to the former agent's house, he suddenly pulled up behind me and began tailgating me extremely aggressively. After doing this for several minutes, he changed lanes, drove right up beside me until he was sure I recognized him, grinned and waved, and then sped off; I saw him exit the freeway at the next off-ramp. (My meeting with the lawyer that day did not go well, especially after I accidentally discovered he was a close friend of the son of my ex-husband's divorce lawyer while I was there.) [I have discovered serious conflict of interest problems with every single lawyer I've been referred to by the state bar.]

All this happened in 2005, but I still sometimes see this man, his wife, or people in his vehicles who appear to be his family members, following and harassing me occasionally, and I have documented incidences of seeing him or his vehicle/s parked outside office buildings owned by my ex- and his family. Although I filed an extremely serious and well-documented complaint against him with the p.i. licensing bureau, the DPS refused to discipline him in any way; in fact, a DPS investigator lied to me over the phone by telling me he could find no record of this man's ever having worked for the FBI. (The tape I made of this phone call has been tampered with.) Even after I complained in person to a San Antonio FBI agent that on one occasion the guy had been following me so closely that I believe his car bumper touched mine when I stopped at a stop sign near my home, nothing was ever done about him.

I-10 At Comfort

The case of the elderly woman discussed in my previous posting is only one example of the many people who've turned up dead under suspicious circumstances in the I-10-Comfort area. Here are some additional examples for your consideration.
In January of 2000, the body of Yuhuai "J.J." Yan of San Antonio was brought to this area from elsewhere and dumped along the side of I-10 just into Gillespie County (only a small corner of which crosses the interstate). This death was ruled a homicide, and a gun dealer from Kerrville was questioned in the case, but no one has ever been charged.
On 3/12/03, Terry Ingram (52) and Pat Kutzer (59) were found brutally murdered on a ranch very close to the interstate here. A severely mentally incapacitated man from KY who appears incapable of defending himself was charged with this crime after his driver's license was conveniently dropped where it was sure to be found at the crime scene.
On 5/7/04, TX State Trooper Kurt Knapp (28) died in a wreck with another car at this interchange (the same one where the elderly woman in the previous posting was found). An article in a local newspaper stated that Trooper Knapp was working on some sort of special task force at the time.
A 9/2/05 local newspaper article mentioned a man from Comfort who was found dead on the side of the road near I-10. This man was never publicly identified, and no additional information was ever given out. I emailed a request to reporter Zeke MacCormack with the San Antonio Express-News asking him to find out who the man was, but Mr. MacCormack never responded to this.
In October of 2007, Theresa Vallado (38) of San Antonio drove to Fredericksburg for Oktoberfest. As she left town to head home, she was stopped by the Fredericksburg police. Shortly after that, she phoned her husband from I-10 to tell him she'd be back soon, but she never arrived. She was found dead in her vehicle under an overpass near Comfort--near wreaths for two other people who'd been found dead at the same spot on Christmas Eve in 1998.
On 2/2/09, Marietta McDonald (65) and Carla Saylor (44) died in a fiery wreck at the same interchange where Trooper Knapp had perished. A month later, David Guzman (40) of Selma and Robert Valderaz (74) of Comfort died in a flaming wreck nearby, on TX 27 west of Comfort in Kendall County. A month after that, Andrew Quasnitschka (21) died in a fiery crash on I-10 nearby in Kendall County.
These are just a few examples; there are many more, especially if you check a bit farther away in both directions--the Phillip Shue case, for example. Coincidentally, when I was married, my former father-in-law owned and rented out a ranch close to this interchange that was located either at the current site of the James Avery Craftsman's Comfort plant or adjacent to it. I don't know what happened to this property after my marriage ended. There used to be a flea market located across the road from this ranch that my children said their father and step-mother took them to many times, but I believe they said it has since closed down.

Death Connections

Deaths around here are often connected by the most amazing coincidences. For example, when a woman whom I believe might have had connections to our case was murdered in San Antonio on 1/1/09 (a day after her parents' home near the LBJ ranch was broken into), a newspaper story about the death in the 1/8/09 San Antonio Express-News featured an interview with a high school classmate of hers--whose family just happens to own property close to mine.

That doesn't impress you? Let's look at a more complicated set of connections involving more than one death. An article in the 6/2/09 Fredericksburg Standard about a 5/14/07 homicide (with similarities to the one above, by the way) featured an extensive interview with a close friend of the victim's who was one of the first people at the crime scene. This friend, who helped fund a reward in the case, had lost her frail, elderly mother on 2/24/03 when she was found dead under a bridge on I-10 near Comfort, TX during an ice storm. (The mother had been using a walker, and I hadn't seen her driving herself in some time. She was a well-known environmentalist who would not have wanted her ranch developed.) This friend also just happens to share an office with the same local doctor who is supposedly developing the property in the gully just west of mine. (Although they have the same office address, the friend is not a doctor and I have never known what she does for a living. She is a close friend of my ex-husband and his family.)

Still just coincidence? Possibly--but wait, there's more. Back on 8/20/03, a rancher with property near the elderly mother/victim's was found dead under a tractor by a neighbor who is related to my former father-in-law. (There is now a major development there called Boot Ranch that locals refer to as "Boot Hill".) Also, the boyfriend of the 5/14/07 homicide victim died on 2/22/09; he was employed at the Office of the Attorney General in Austin at the time.

These are just some of the examples of connections between deaths that I'm aware of; there are many more.

The Tale of the Drs. Cone

Back in the 1990s when I was still married, one of my ex-husband's favorite stories to tell was that of his good buddy, Dr. Anson Cone, and his first wife, Dr. Florence Cone (who usually preferred to use her maiden name so she wouldn't have to be called "Flo Cone"). Anson, a radiologist, and Flo, a pathologist, were San Antonio physicians who were in the process of moving to the Texas Hill Country, and he was already working here. One Friday, Flo discovered a flat tire on her vehicle, and Anson changed it for her. The next morning, he came to work at the local hospital; the plan was that she would drive up from San Antonio later that morning and bring some of their things.

While Flo was driving on Interstate 10 between San Antonio and Boerne, the wheel suddenly came off her vehicle, causing it to roll over several times; her neck was broken and she apparently died instantly. My ex-husband said he was also working at the hospital that morning and that he was with Anson when the shocking news came in that Flo was dead. I remember attending Flo's funeral in San Antonio with my husband and also the burial service here--everyone was very sad except for Anson, who seemed remarkably upbeat for someone suddenly widowed.

A few months later, Anson suddenly remarried a local woman and my husband began talking obsessively about the fact that Anson was the beneficiary of two life insurance policies on Flo, one for 7 million dollars and the other for 7.5 million dollars. Of course the insurance company refused to pay, so a major court battle ensued. In the end, my husband said the court forced the insurance company to pay both of the policies in full, making Anson and his new wife very wealthy.

I was reminded of this story again recently while talking with a mutual friend. Anson and Flo had a daughter together, and my friend said the daughter had been accepted to medical school. I mentioned how proud Flo would have been about this and was told it was not yet certain that her daughter would actually be able to go to medical school--it seems Anson and his wife had flatly refused to help her out financially in any way. [My friend also said Anson might possibly be related to a couple named Wright who used to be listed as owning the gully just west of our property that is currently under heavy construction, although she wasn't positive about this.]