Murder of Wayne and Sharmon Stock

[Chris_Halkides]

Wayne and Sharmon Stock were murdered in April of 2006 in their farmhouse outside of Murdock, Nebraska. The police had arrested Matt Livers and Nick Sampson, a cook at the local bar and grill, largely on the basis of Mr. Livers’ false confession. Mr. Livers had also failed a lie detector test administered by Charlie O’Callaghan. However, a ring and a bong found at the murder scene implicated Gregory Fester and Jessica Reid, two Wisconsin teenagers. Kirby Drake was a sibling of Sharmon Stock. The two innocent Nebraska men were released before the case came to trial.

In the book Bloody Lies John Ferak wrote, “On April 17, [Kirby] Drake helped persuade the hometown Sheriff’s investigators to focus entirely on Matt Livers, the victims’ estranged nephew. Now, three weeks after the Nebraska news media plastered the new jailhouse mug shots of Wisconsin teenagers Fester and Reid everywhere, Drake was moved to contact Sergeant Weyers. According to Drake, once he saw Fester’s mug shot in the newspaper, he “knew” he had seen Fester at least once before in Murdock’s Bulldogs Bar & Grill…Besides New Year’s Eve, Drake recalled visiting the bar for his birthday on January 10, 2006, and to pick up a large dinner takeout order on Easter Sunday—only hours before his sister and brother-in-law were slain…Suddenly, a new face inside the bar gave Drake an “uneasy feeling.” A young man with dark hair halfway down his ack walked past him and headed toward the kitchen and restrooms, Drake told police. Drake claimed he asked one of the patrons about the new stranger in town and one of them answered, ‘Gregory Fester II from Wisconsin…a friend of Nick Sampson’s’…Drake claimed he saw a large dog in the back of a red [pickup] truck bearing Wisconsin license plates…Coincidentally, Nick Sampson also had two large dogs that matched the same general description.”

Mr. Ferak continued, “They [Cass County Investigators] made it easy for Drake by furnishing him with a photo lineup consisting of six long-haired dudes. One of the mug shots included the very same photo of Fester that had been splashed across the Nebraska news media during the previous month.” Drake picked this photo out. O’Callaghan administered a lie detector test and found Drake to be truthful. Other witnesses remembered Mr. Drake’s being at the bar but did not remember seeing Mr. Fester.

Some of the investigators were incompetent and at least one engaged in fraudulent. Yet the portion of the investigation performed primarily by some Wisconsin officers was outstanding and praiseworth; that is why I think this murder case deserves its own thread. I decided to begin with Mr. Drake (only a small corner of the case) because he was potentially swayed by a published photograph, and because a photo lineup was tilted. Both of these can be found in other threads here, including the one on Luke Mitchell.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Kirby Drake's testimony would have created a conspiracy between the two actual killers (Jessica Reid and Gregory Fester) and Matt Livers and Nick Sampson that would have rivaled anything that came out of Perugia, Italy shortly thereafter. Mr. Sampson and Mr. Livers were never charged, but forensic scientist David Kofoed was later put on trial for allegedly planting a blood drop in Mr. Sampson's car. Mr. Drake testified for the defense. Mr. Ferak wrote (p. 192) that the prosecutor leading the case against Mr. Kofoed, Clarence Mock, knew that Mr. Drake's testimony was "utterly preposterous and lacked any credibility." In some ways it is remarkable that Mr. Livers and Mr. Sampson were not tried and convicted, given that Mr. Kofoed planted evidence and Mr. Drake was willing to testify to against them.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

After Matt Livers (Nick Sampson was the other man accused of the double murder) made a confession, he retracted it the next day. Later David Kofoed, who headed the county's CSI unit, found an incriminating spot of blood in Mr. Sampson's car. Other evidence at the scene (a bong and a stolen ring) pointed to a Wisconsin couple as the true culprits, and Mr. Livers' confession is generally reckoned as being the false product of a lengthy investigation of someone with below average intelligence. Mr. Kofoed was found guilty of planting the blood spot and is suspected of planting DNA evidence in at least one other case. John Ferak indicated that Mr. Kofoed was also suspected of planting fingerprint evidence, but I have not found as much information on this as I would like. Here is another excerpt from his book Bloody Lies: "The fallout from Kofoed’s evidence-planting scandal may take many more years to wind through Nebraska’ criminal justice system. Astonishingly, the prospect of any meaningful independent audit probing Kofoed’s casework appears unlikely. It fell beyond the scope of the Nebraska Supreme Court’s jurisdiction to appoint an independent committee to investigate the work of Kofoed and others within the Douglas County CSI unit, the court’s justices ruled in 2012."