As the digging continued, Wood and Miller could see “scallop marks” at the edges of the site, evidence of digging with a round-nosed shovel.
When the hole was still only inches deep, a human shoulder became visible.
As expected, it was the remains of Denise Amber Lee.
The medical examiner was called. Body found.
Wood and Miller used a variety of small shovels at first, but they switched to brushes once the body became visible. There would come a time when digging from the top of the hole was no longer practical. They would need a way to get at the earth at the sides of and underneath the body without hanging upside down. This, in essence, opened a door to the grave site and allowed them greater access to the soil under the body. The shallow grave ended up being four feet deep. Photos and videos were taken throughout the excavation. After a time, a plastic sheet was placed over it to prevent contamination from any trace evidence, possible wind-borne, that might blow into the hole.
The medical examiner was off duty, so his backup, Dr. Daniel Schultz, a competent forensic anthropologist in his own right, came to the scene and took charge. He officially pronounced the body dead, and the remains were wrapped in a plastic sheet, then lifted from the hole at 3:56 P.M.
There was soil still stuck to the body’s face, but Dr. Schultz didn’t remove it. He could see that there was also blood on the face, and he didn’t want to disrupt that.
The body had been packed in moist soil, a factor when he tried to determine time of death by taking the body temperature. The remains were wet for a while. The hands were a washerwoman’s hands. He’d seen hands like those before, on bodies pulled from swimming pools.
Once out of the hole, the cadaver was briefly unwrapped. Dr. Schultz noted fixed lividity—that is, a bruise-like discoloration—on the left side. With death, the blood stopped circulating and became subject to little else but gravity. Blood pooled on the bottom. Rigor mortis had set in. The woman had survived only a matter of hours after her abduction.
Dr. Schultz didn’t want to jump to conclusions as to cause of death, but the woman had suffered a potentially fatal gunshot wound to the head. He ordered her rewrapped and taken to the morgue. Everything he could see here, he could see better in the perfect light of the autopsy room.
After the body was photographed and removed, the archaeologists noted that some water seepage had gotten into the bottom of the grave site and the trench they’d dug.
Work continued at the grave site even after the body was gone. More layers of dirt were removed, sifted for hidden evidence, and bagged for laboratory analysis.
As soon as the victim’s body was found, and it was determined that a single gunshot most likely killed her, crime scene specialists examined the area with that in mind. They found a ring of dirty blond hair around an apparent bullet hole in a palmetto leaf only a few paces from the hole in the ground. Along that same path, police found a patch of shredded bark close to the ground, where the bullet apparently grazed a tree trunk. By running a string taut between the hole in the leaf and the groove in the trunk, they accurately determined the path of the bullet, which hit the ground just a couple of feet on the other side of the barbed-wire fence.
Well-wishers tied yellow ribbons around trees near the Lees’ home. Denise’s family was notified of the body’s discovery; they gathered at the Goff home for the grim wait, until the remains were positively identified.
Police, however, didn’t have to wait. They were allowed to assume. They theorized immediately that Michael King took Denise Lee to the remote location, dug the grave with a shovel he’d borrowed a few hours earlier, shot Denise to death, and then jumped into a pond or drainage ditch in an attempt to wash blood from his clothes and skin. The search continued for the victim’s clothes and the murder weapon.
The sad duty of telling the press of the discovery went to North Port police chief Terry Lewis, who said, “Today, forensics experts from the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office and the medical examiner’s office did a very detailed, long search, and we’ve discovered the remains of an unidentified white female buried at that location. It will take several hours to make a positive identification of the remains.”
Still, the assumption was there, and everyone knew it.
Any connection between the suspect and the victim? No, Lewis said. “We have nothing to believe this was anything other than a random act of violence.”
When King’s neighbors heard about the murder, they almost exploded with frustration. Everyone knew there was something wrong in that house. Brian and Dana Lewis, King’s next-door neighbors, had called police on King twelve times since 2003, but police said they could never do anything because of lack of evidence. The Lewises complained that he’d thrown battery acid in their pool, pelted their car with eggs, and had slashed their tires, among other things. They said that until the previous year, Michael King, who was divorced, had been living with his grade-school-aged son. One neighbor complained that King had been stalking his daughter from the bus stop.
Sitting in his jail cell, Michael King was informed that a body had been found, more than likely that of the woman he’d been with.
“I’ll never go to prison,” he said. “I’ll kill myself first.”
In short order, the remains were identified as those of Denise Lee. Murder charges were added to those already filed against King.
Rick Goff tried to make a public statement but broke down. Nate Lee managed to say, “I’m going to miss her so much. And I don’t know how I’m going to go through the rest of my life without her.”
Investigation revealed that their suspect had been having financial troubles due to unemployment. He was under threat of foreclosure on his Sardinia Avenue home.
Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) Crime Laboratory analyst Steve Balunan processed the Lee home in search of previously undiscovered evidence. The residence was freshly photographed, documented, searched, and sketched.
The living-room carpet was vacuumed for trace-type evidence, and carpet standards were obtained. The house was thoroughly dusted for fingerprints. Among others, three prints were lifted from the interior of the sliding glass doors at the rear of the house.
Collected as evidence from the home were three pillowcases and a sheet from the master bedroom. A feminine pad from the bedroom garbage can was also seized. Three toothbrushes were taken from the master bathroom.
Other items taken were the cell phone resting atop a dresser in the southeast bedroom, and a tissue from the floor in front of the nightstand in the master bedroom.
That same day, just past noon, police tracked down Jennifer Robb, King’s ex-girlfriend, at her home in Homosassa, Florida. The lawn had been mostly burned away, revealing a near-white sandy soil. There were children’s toys in the back, and a rusted burn barrel on the side.
As were all of King’s women, Jennifer was diminutive. She weighed 102 pounds, and was born January 29, 1976. She admitted to knowing King, and ID’d his photo. Cops asked, “When and where did you meet Mike?”
“February 2006, at a wedding in Ocala,” she said. “We were both alone and they had dancin’.” She approached him. He said he didn’t dance, but they got to talking.
Mike introduced himself, said he lived in Sarasota, was divorced, had a son. She said she was a single parent also—two kids, a ten-year-old boy and a three-year-old girl. They exchanged numbers.
After the wedding, three weeks went by, and she called him. They spoke regularly on the phone over the next month before arranging to get together.
No e-mails. She didn’t do computer. She had one, but they said it didn’t have enough megabytes to get on the Internet, so she just played games on it. Mike didn’t have a computer. Well, his son did—but it only was used for game playing as well.
For their first date, Mike drove up to Homosassa. She didn’t travel well. He arrived about 10:00 P.M. They met in a video store parking lot, each driving his and her own car. From there, he drove he
r—in his red Corvette—to Denny’s, where they had dinner. Afterward, they went to a dock, where it was dark and they were alone. Jennifer made jokes about being in such a vulnerable position with a “practical stranger.”
She couldn’t swim, but she didn’t let him know that. She told him, for all he knew, she might be the psycho and she could push him into the water. She asked if he could swim. The jokes made Mike nervous. He was so quiet.
They moved off the dock when a bunch of rowdy kids showed up and ruined the ambiance. They went to a different spot, on the other side of the parking lot, where they talked till dawn.
“Talked about this and that. I don’t know about what all—but I did most of the talking,” Jennifer explained.
Mike told her he was a “master plumber,” made good money. She said she worked at her dad’s pet store. She said he probably wouldn’t like her neighborhood, as it was all “trailer trash.” He said his mom lived in a trailer. She told him her son was biracial and asked if that was an issue. Mike said he had no problem with that. He and his family were familiar with biracial couples. With the morning light, he drove Jennifer back to her car. He had a long drive back down to North Port. He tried to give her fifty bucks. “I don’t need no money. I’m not strugglin’ that bad,” Jennifer said. He told her to spend it on her kids. She couldn’t argue with that, so she took the money.
They had a couple of dates after that, one at a flea market; then they got together at a park with their kids, so everyone could meet. He said he wanted to make sure Jennifer and his son, Matthew, got along because the kid had had issues with the women in his life.
Matt and Tyler were about the same age, so they hit it off. Mike and Jennifer did weekends together after that, including a trip to Disney. He picked her and her son up at her house. Her daughter stayed home with a sitter.
He couldn’t find her house. “I had to give him directions many times,” she said.
They all rode around in his white van and stayed in one hotel room; the boys in one bed, Mike and Jennifer in the other. “Lights were left on. Nothing happened,” she added.
But he was so calm—and he made her comfortable. Next day, Mike drove Jennifer and her son home. The babysitter, a friend of Jennifer’s sister, met Mike and told Jennifer, “He’s a cute one. You better hang on to him.”
In another circumstance, Jennifer might have been suspicious that Mike was still married or had another girlfriend, but she could tell by the way Matt talked that there was no one.
Still, he had everything going for him, and she couldn’t figure why he’d be interested in a poor mother of two—especially one who lived fifty miles away. She never would have a good answer for that one.
The relationship grew. Mike met her parents and they all went together to the aquarium in Tampa. Jennifer’s mother got sick, had to be on a ventilator, and Mike came to visit Jennifer at the hospital in Ocala. “He’d come sit with me,” she said.
That was when they became lovers. They were at her house. The kids weren’t there.
“I don’t know who came on to who,” she said, although she considered herself the dominant one. The sex was normal—very, very straight. She remembered having to tell him to loosen up. He said he was not “involved that much” with sex. When he was married, there wasn’t a lot of sex involved, and she believed him. The only unusual thing he liked was having his feet rubbed, and she didn’t think it that strange. He was “just shy,” when it came to stuff like that.
“Of course, there were some things I told him right off the bat I wouldn’t do, so don’t ask. Nothing with toys, nothing that wasn’t the natural way. He said no problem to that,” Jennifer remembered.
She tried to buy him a pornographic magazine once, but he said he didn’t want it. The only magazines he was interested in were about cars. “Cars, cars, cars,” Jennifer said. He was still quiet, unless the subject was something he knew about. “If it was plumbing or cars, he’d run his mouth,” she recalled.
Her mom complained that Mike didn’t know how to make conversation, but her dad had better luck. Jennifer told her mother she had to talk about a man subject. “That was what Mike could do.”
Mike was more affectionate toward her daughter than her son, she noticed. She was the more affectionate child. It never made Jennifer uncomfortable, though. He didn’t handle her in a weird way or anything, and he was never left alone with her.
Mike was with her parents a lot more than she was with his. Jennifer met his parents a total of four times, tops. He drove her down there and she had dinner with them. “His mom was different. She was okay. His dad was a really nice guy,” Jennifer opined.
She asked Mike what was the deal with his ex-wife; did he think he’d ever get back with her? He said no way. She was out of state. Maybe they spoke twice a year.
In July 2006, Jennifer’s mom got out of the hospital and she left her kids in Homosassa and moved in with Mike at his house in North Port. The first time she saw the house on Sardinia was when she was moving in. She remembered he had a stomachache. Turned out to be ulcers or something. His kitchen was done up nice, because his mother had done that, but the rest of the house was sparsely furnished, with little or nothing on the walls. The school across the street was under construction, but scheduled to open for the next school year. She admitted she was a little worried about money. She doubted her father was going to keep paying her if she stopped working at his store. Mike said not to worry and gave her a small diamond ring. She had no friends in North Port, and the only friend of his that she knew about was a guy named Rob. They had dinner at his house once, with Rob and his wife.
The police showed Jennifer a photo of Rob Salvador, King’s friend from the shooting range—and she said that was the guy. She remembered Rob and his wife had a lot of kids (six, police knew) and were deeply religious. Before they went over there, Mike warned his son to watch his language in front of them. Jennifer remembered thinking, sure, it was okay for Matt to curse around her.
There was also a guy named Carlos Saenz (pseudonym), who worked with Michael King. He was a funny guy, but not the type you’d want to hang around with, Mike said. He skipped work a lot and pulled the Hispanic card if they tried to fire him.
Did King mention any family living in North Port? Jennifer said he said something about having a cousin who lived nearby, but she never met the guy. (Police concluded this was a reference to Harold Muxlow.)
King didn’t want Jennifer to work, so she stayed home and cleaned. “That was the cleanest I ever had a house,” she said, “because I didn’t have anything else to do.”
He told her they would never break up. There was no reason for her to keep her home in Homosassa. He allowed her to pick up some of her stuff, but the washer and dryer stayed behind. If they did break up, he’d buy her a new one.
Jennifer went along with it, but she didn’t completely buy it. She’d been around the block once or twice, and had heard this story before. She left a lot behind, and he never took her back to get it.
She didn’t even call her parents. She had her cell phone but not the charger. King, she later learned, knew her family was looking for her, but didn’t relay the message.
It wasn’t right to call her a captive. She had her car and she could leave. Mike, in fact, would tell her to go out, go to a store. She didn’t know her way around, so she stayed in the house. The only road she knew was the one that went to Super Walmart.
They did get her kids, and her son went to school across the street. King wasn’t stingy with money and always made sure they had enough to eat.
When bored she’d go for walks during the day, but Mike said don’t, there were a lot of construction workers up and down the street and he didn’t want them looking at her.
Eventually Jennifer started talking to her dad again.
When that little girl was murdered in North Port, King told Jennifer that she and her daughter should be extra vigilant regarding strangers, and should always keep the door lo
cked when he wasn’t around. King said they shouldn’t go to the grocery store. In fact, he didn’t think Jennifer should take her daughter outside at all. When he got home, he said, he would take them to the grocery store.
One time, a neighbor lady came to visit and Jennifer fixed her a cup of tea. When Mike heard about that, he was unhappy and told Jennifer he didn’t get along with his neighbors.
She was a big help to him when it came to paying his bills. He had trouble writing checks—getting the numerals in the right order and writing the amount in words—and Jennifer helped him. His mortgage payment was huge, she recalled, and she also had trouble writing a number that big in words.
Stuck in the house all day, Jennifer had plenty of time to snoop through his stuff. To her relief, she learned that he really was divorced. There was also evidence of previous girlfriends. One of his ex-girlfriends, in particular, left a bunch of stuff at his house. As far as Jennifer knew, she never got any of it back.
It was when they talked about his exes that they began to quarrel. The arguments with King got worse and worse.
In October 2006, the blowout fight started when Mike lied about going to a tanning place. He called her a nasty name and she threw macaroni and cheese at him. He said she was looking for an excuse to go back, and she said maybe she was. She grabbed her kids, some of their stuff, and hightailed it back toward Homosassa. As she was headed out, he got on the phone, making like he was calling the cops on her.
She didn’t make it all the way, but called her dad from a cheap hotel and told him she was broke. Dad said they were always welcome back home. Mike called Jennifer’s dad after a few days and said he just wanted to make sure she and the kids were safe.
Michael Benson's True Crime Bundle Page 38