Invisible Killer

by Diana Montane

  The larynx, trachea, bronchi are filled with foamy fluid. Lungs show minimal anthracosis, but both are enlarged and heavy due to copious quantities of pulmonary edema, the right weighing 985 grams and the left 860 grams.

  On examination of the abdominal cavity, the fatty panniculus measures 3.0 cm. The peritoneal surfaces are smooth and glistening, there is no excess fluid or adhesions, and abdominal organs are in proper position. The mucosa of the entire GI tract is generally intact except for occasional puncture wounds of the small bowel, and the appendix is present and uninjured. The stomach contains an estimated 150 cc of food and fluid consisting of tomatoes, watermelon seeds, peanuts, popcorn seeds, cottage cheese, and zucchini or pickle like green vegetable fragments. Small bowel and colonic contents appear normal. The liver weighs exactly 1470 grams and cut surface is normal without evidence of scarring. The gallbladder is normal and the biliary system is patent. The pancreas has normal contour, size, and position. Cut surface reveals the normal tan lobular appearance. The spleen weighs exactly 110 grams with slight wrinkling of the capsule. Its cut surface appears normal.

  On examination of the retroperitoneal and pelvic structures, the adrenal glands are normal in position and appearance. The kidneys have the usual bean-shaped contour and each weighs exactly 100 grams. The cortex measures 0.7 cm and the medulla 1.2 cm in thickness. Collecting systems are patent and normal. Urinary bladder is contracted and devoid of urine with normal mucosa. The uterus is normal in appearance. Fallopian tubes have been severed with the distal ends absent. The ovaries are normal in appearance, and one contains a corpus luteum with central gray zone. Lymph nodes are small and visible but unremarkable.

  On examination of the cranial cavity, the skull is intact. No internal bleeding is noted. The cranial fossae are intact and sella turcica appears normal. Pituitary gland is grossly normal. The brain weighs exactly 1350 grams. The gyri and sulci are of normal width. Cranial blood vessels are patent without evidence of significant arteriosclerosis or congenital anomalies. Sectioning of the brain reveals no abnormalities.

  TOXICOLOGY EXAMINATION: Blood in NaF tubes and serum are collected. Blood is collected in EDTA tubes and turned over to Detective Trish Almeda of Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. A “rape kit” is collected with oral, vaginal, and rectal swabs; fragments from skin; combed and plucked pubic hairs; and plucked scalp hairs; and all are turned over to the Sheriff’s Department.

  MICROSCOPIC EXAMINATION:

  Cardiovascular: Sections of atrium reveal no abnormalities of endocardium, myocardium, or epicardium. Sections of pericardium reveal acute hemorrhage in the adventitial fat.

  Respiratory: Sections of lung reveal areas of pulmonary edema and minimal anthracosis. Alveolar spaces and walls are fairly normal in appearance.

  Gastrointestinal: Section of esophagus is unremarkable as is section of appendix. Small bowel is relatively well preserved with slight postmortem autolysis of surface mucosa. Section of colon reveals a small amount of recent hemorrhage in the submucosa. Section of stomach and small bowel at pylorus reveals fairly well preserved mucosa with only superficial early postmortem sloughing and no significant underlying pathology.

  Liver and Gallbladder: Gallbladder is well preserved except for loss of mucosal cells, and there appears to be underlying chronic cholecystitis. Sections of liver are well preserved with normal architecture. No evidence of scarring or inflammation. Areas of congestion are evident to a mild degree, particularly subcapsular, and there is one area of recent hemorrhage in soft tissues adjacent to liver.

  Pancreas: Well preserved with no signs of postmortem autolysis and no abnormalities noted.

  Spleen: A suggestion of focal subcapsular recent hemorrhages, otherwise no abnormalities.

  Genitourinary: Sections of kidney are well preserved without evident abnormalities. Urinary bladder wall is unremarkable. One section of ovary shows corpus albicantia and another shows active corpus luteum. Section of cervix shows mild chronic cervicitis with squamous metaplasia.

  Endocrine: Pituitary gland is unremarkable. Thyroid and adrenal glands are likewise normal in appearance.

  Lymphatic: Sections of three lymph nodes are unremarkable. One shows mild anthracosis and is therefore probably hilar in origin.

  Infrequent germinal centers are present in a normal frequency.

  Central Nervous System: Section of medulla oblongata is well preserved and unremarkable. Section of pans reveals no abnormalities. Sections of cerebellum, dentate nucleus, and hippocampus are likewise unremarkable. Sections of basal ganglia and cerebral cortex are generally unremarkable. One small focus of calcification is present in one section of cerebral cortex in the adjacent white matter.

  ANATOMICAL DIAGNOSES:

  1. Incised wound of chest with excision of heart and right nipple, left hemothorax, lacerations of pericardium, diaphragm, and liver.

  2. Incised wound of abdomen with multiple punctures of small bowel and mesentery and right retroperitoneal hemorrhage.

  3. Incised wounds of neck transection of right carotid artery, trachea, and esophagus, and exsanguination.

  4. Severe pulmonary edema secondary to salt water drowning.

  5. Chronic cholecystitis.

  6. Chronic cervicitis with squamous metaplasia.

  7. Recent hemorrhage, colon, liver, spleen, pericardium.

  8. Focal calcification, cerebral white matter, significance undetermined.

  CAUSE OF DEATH: Salt water drowning and exsanguination due to traumatic wounds.

  MANNER OF DEATH: Homicide.

  TOXICOLOGY FINDINGS: Negative. See attached report.

  R.O. Nelms, Jr., M.D.

  Medical Examiner

  District Sixteen

  Monroe County, Florida

  It states there were no drugs found in her system.

  Marty Helfrich Morgenrath, Teri and Mary Lou’s sister, remembered something peculiar about the Sherry Perisho case.

  “The last time we were there, at Charlie and Teri’s home on Big Pine Key, my husband and I wanted to go kayaking. I looked at renting [a kayak], and then we both decided to buy one and keep it there at their house. So we went kayaking several times, and Teri got very upset about that, and we found that strange, because we only went to visit once every two or three years. Then, later, when we went back, we’d realized we kayaked right past where Sherry Perisho’s boat was.”

  Nobody knows whether Teri Helfrich Brandt knew with any degree of certainty whether her husband Charlie was responsible for the murder of Sherry Perisho. But everyone was certain that if she subconsciously knew, she was in deep denial about it, and it cost her her life.

  In 2004, Seminole County investigators conducted an interview with Patricia McClintock, or Pat Helfrich, the second-oldest of Teri’s sisters after Mary Lou, Michelle’s mother.

  Pat had spent a lot of time with her baby sister and her new brother-in-law, and found them to be madly in love with each other. Charlie did not want children, and the sister thought Charlie felt they would take all the attention away from him, “since [he and Teri] were so into each other.” But then, Pat also recalled that Charlie never talked about his family. And then came the “glazed look” that everyone talked about. “There were sometimes you couldn’t talk to Charlie,” the sister explained. “It was like he wasn’t there.”

  “They both drank quite a bit,” she said. “I would say my sister was a borderline alcoholic. And when she drank, she could really push buttons.”

  Pat experienced this during an excursion to Europe with her youngest sister. “I took her with me to Italy, to ski, with some friends of mine. Well, we were all ready to go and Teri didn’t want to go, and she exploded with foul language. When she didn’t want to do something she didn’t want to do it. Period.”

  Pat remembered another time on Little Palm Island, where Teri worked at a resort for a while. “Teri was getting flirtatious with some of the men on the boat, and Charlie had to hold her back. But he didn’t do it in an angry way
. He was mellow, kind of slow.” Everyone described Charlie as “slow.” Slow and deliberate and with a vacant look in his eyes: It fits almost every description of every horror movie’s bogeyman. One time, joking with Agent Dennis Haley, we compared Charlie to Michael Myers of Halloween, who never dies. Haley laughed and quipped back, “He reminds me more of Jason!” meaning the deranged murderer with the hockey mask on Friday the 13th. The following incident brings this image closer to a demonic reality.

  “A SERIAL KILLER IS ON THE LOOSE”

  The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary: men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.

  — Joseph Conrad

  The experiences about to be described here may sound like so much nonsense or fairy dust to the incredulous, or even to the rational and sensible. Several people, however, witnessed them. And if some believe that the souls of some people who have died violently have not “crossed over to the light” and remain earthbound, explanations exist, albeit unsatisfactory to nonbelievers.

  One reason: a spirit becomes attached to one or more living persons and wants to keep making contact. Thus, the phenomena of poltergeist experiences.

  Gina Buell, who operates several of her family’s restaurants in the Altamonte Springs area, was, at the time when this experience occurred, a young mother whose children attended a school owned and run by Debbie Knight, Michelle Jones’s best friend.

  Gina’s mother, Gerry, is very good friends with British psychic Rosemary Altea, who has written several books.

  “I was very skeptical,” Gina said about psychic experiences. “But one time I was in college and was home for the summer, and decided I would go riding. My horse is really big, and he was very excited to go to the horse show. I went to the ring and was very apprehensive at first, and very nervous. Then suddenly a great calm came over me and, much to my surprise, I won all the riding awards. I came home and showed my trophies, and all of a sudden Rosemary looked to my left, and said, ‘I know there is someone here who insists on talking to you.’” Rosemary told me the story of Romulus and Remus, the mythical founders of Rome who were cast into the Tiber River and rescued by a she-wolf, and I immediately knew who it was: my grandfather! He always used to tell me that story! Rosemary started talking about the horse show, and what I did right. Then she looked at me and said, ‘I want you to stop beating yourself up.’ When my grandfather was in the hospital I was a brat, and then he passed away. And I always felt so guilty.”

  One time, when Gina went back to her children’s school, Debbie Knight told her she had had a death in the family. The next time Gina saw Debbie it was at a school meeting, and Rosemary Altea happened to be in town.

  There was a school board meeting. “I was very insistent on going to the meeting,” Gina said. “Something was dragging me there. When I saw Debbie, I gave her a hug.”

  Debbie had mentioned previously she thought there was something in her house, a presence that kept going up and down the steps on the stairs in her guesthouse.

  “I said to Debbie, ‘Could I see you outside for a minute? I understand you had a death in the family, but my mom’s friend is a psychic medium.’” Debbie asked, “Can she come to my house?” Gina called her mother. Her mother asked Rosemary, and Rosemary said she would go to Debbie’s house on a Saturday morning, at 8:00 a.m.

  “I get there, and her husband is outside with the girls, and the girls could not get out of the house fast enough,” Gina remembers.

  Rosemary Altea has documented this encounter in her book, A Matter of Life or Death.

  While the psychic was getting dressed, her guide, White Eagle, said, “This is more than you think.” Once at the house, Debbie Knight said, “There’s something here, in the guesthouse. My husband and my kids have seen it.” And Gina noticed that it was freezing in the guesthouse. “And it was the sunniest, brightest morning. There was also this awful smell in the place.”

  Rosemary walked past the kitchen, up the stairs, and into a room where there was a dining room table and love seat. “When Rosemary got in between the two bedrooms,” Gina recounts. “She said, ‘Right?’ and she started taking off her jewelry. I was looking at my mom and asking her with my eyes, what is she doing? My mom smiled.”

  Rosemary had told the group that if she took off her jewelry, it meant there was a malignant presence and the energy would make her jewelry burn into her skin.

  Gina continued her narration of the encounter: “So Rosemary said, ‘Okay somebody’s here.’ Rosemary had me sit on the coffee-table Debbie was straight ahead, Rosemary to my left. And Rosemary said, ‘This is what we’re going to do. If you want to leave right now, don’t scream or say anything. But if you stay, don’t break the chain—we were holding hands. Rosemary started reciting the Hail Mary and Our Father. She said that my grandfather, her guide Gray Eagle, Debbie’s mother and my grandmother, who had both passed, and four angels were there. Rosemary started praying. Michelle kept trying to get into Rosemary. She went through exactly what happened in detail. I could hear Michelle through Rosemary. Rosemary’s English accent was gone!”

  Rosemary was narrating through all of this, and telling how Debbie had been over at Michelle’s the night before.

  By all accounts, Debbie had stayed the weekend at Michelle’s house at Michelle’s insistence that Debbie not drive if they were drinking. Debbie had stayed Friday and Saturday nights. She had gone to the kitchen on Saturday in the early morning hours to get a glass of water, and found Charlie pacing and pacing and pacing in the kitchen. She smiled and was slightly taken aback, and then Charlie stood over behind the kitchen counter, by the knives, and Debbie thought he was looking at her breasts. She felt so uncomfortable she left early Sunday morning.

  Debbie had discussed this with Michelle, and said, “Your uncle is weird!” Michelle dismissed it, laughing and saying, “No, he’s just a big teddy bear.”

  But back at Debbie’s house, Gina remembered, “Debbie was crying so hard, her nose was running so hard, there was a puddle in her lap. I remember Michelle screaming; I was jumping out of my skin. Michelle was so angry, she was putting on the fight of her life. Rosemary was telling Michelle to go to her angels. There was a freaking battle going on in that room! The kitchen cabinets were opening and shutting, and someone was running up and down the stairs…Rosemary was telling him, ‘You need to leave!’ But he was telling her, ‘I’m going to get her, and I’m going to get you.’ Michelle was refusing to leave. My mom and I didn’t know whether to leave. Rosemary was telling Michelle to go to her angels. Rosemary finally convinced her to go. Then, all of a sudden, the light came through the window, the stench was gone, and I thought I was crazy. I had to go to a birthday party for my son, and I was a basket case.”

  Rosemary Altea begins a chapter of her book: “There is a serial killer on the loose. A serial killer connected to at least 23 murders, and with the next victim already chosen.”

  She writes that the monster was all around, all-consuming. He said, “I’m going to get her, and then I’m going to get you.” There was no doubt, Altea states: ‘We were in the presence of the Devil.”

  Debbie was there, and so was Gina, and Gerry, Gina’s mother. They all seemed to witness what went on.

  Debbie and her husband Pat, whom she says is a non-believer, kept hearing footsteps going up and down the stairs of their guest home, which is adjacent to their own. Debbie had been having terrifying nightmares, and was convinced there was a presence in the house.

  Rosemary heard her guide, Gray Eagle, say: “Pay attention; things are not as they might appear to be. Don’t be complacent, Rosemary, don’t be complacent.”

  The chapter from Altea’s book states the psychic went to see Debbie on a Saturday morning. Debbie was shaking and crying and told Rosemary the whole story.

  They went to the guesthouse, and Debbie and Gerry and Tina stood by the door. Altea explained the procedure in case there was an evil presence in the house. The guests would know if there was s
omething wrong if Rosemary began taking off all of her jewelry. If she went into a trance state her energy could be strong enough that it would burn her skin if it came into contact with her jewelry.

  She told Gerry, “If anything happens, just pray, and pray for light and angels…”

  As she headed across the living room into the bedroom, wham! She felt as if someone had thrown a football, hard, right at her stomach.

  Then the energy in the space went back to normal, but there was a sound.

  Altea went back into the living room, took off all of her jewelry, and told the women that indeed there was a very malignant presence in the room. “Once we begin this, we must not leave until it’s over. If I go into a trance it is very important we stay together in case I have to rely on your energy.” And, she added, “in case there is a dark soul.”

  And then she realized Michelle had come to stand beside her friend Debbie. Gray Eagle was also there. The angels were there, but they had turned their backs. They would not interfere. The women, and whatever was there, were on their own.

  Rosemary smiled at Michelle, but Michelle did not smile back. She was angry and afraid. “I knew instantly this young woman was in trouble.” Rosemary then felt a very disgusting taste in her mouth, “like decaying, rotten meat. The monster was hiding.” She felt the shadow was behind her, the same shadow Debbie and her husband shad seen moving through the house. Rosemary knew what Debbie had known all along: that the shadow was Michelle’s killer, and that Debbie was next.

  Rosemary was the most dangerous one in the room for him, so he wanted to destroy her energy and diffuse her power. “The monster’s ace card was fear…Negative energy made him strong. Michelle was full of anger, resentment, and fear.” Debbie too, was resentful and fearful. “He was good, very good,” Rosemary remembered.