August 7, 2024 • 40 mins
Melissa Patton grows up in Locust Grove, Georgia with her parents and older sister, Tina. In high school, Melissa is head over heels for Christopher Wolfenbarger. The two quickly marry after graduating and move to Atlanta with their baby daughter Christina. When the couple welcomes a son, Joey, they settle in a duplex. Melissa works alongside her sister near the airport.
Thanksgiving Day, Melissa Wolfenbarger visits her parents, Carl and Norma Patton. Melissa is excited for the holidays and asks her mother for a very specific gift. When Melissa doesn’t even call Christmas day, Norma Patton is unsettled. Melissa doesn’t have a cell phone or a car, so Norma assumes her daughter is busy with her own family and will pick up her gifts later. When Melissa doesn’t wish her mom a happy birthday two months later, Norma Patton asks family members if anyone has seen her. Tina Patton realizes Melissa hasn’t worked a shift with her in months. Then, Melissa misses her mother's birthday.
Atlanta PD finds a severed human skull, that rolled out of a ripped trash bag in the middle of Avon Avenue. Just over a month later, four more trash bags are discovered two blocks down Avon in wooded area. Inside are a pair of legs and arms. Police cannot locate a torso. It would be more than four years before the body is identified as Melissa Wolfenbarger, and 25 years before police arrest her killer.
Joining Nancy Grace today:
- Tina Patton - Sister of Melissa Wolfenbarger
- Norma Patton - Mother of Melissa Wolfenbarger
- Darryl Cohen - Former Assistant District Attorney, Former Assistant State Attorney, Defense Attorney, Cohen, Cooper, Estep, & Allen, LLC, CCEAlaw.com, Facebook: "Darryl B Cohen", Twitter: @DarrylBCohen
- Sheryl McCullum - Cold Case Investigative Research Institute Founder, ColdCaseCrimes.org, Host of new podcast: Zone 7, Twitter: @ColdCaseTips
- Joseph Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics: Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet", Host: "Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan", @JoScottForensic
- Sydney Sumner - CrimeOnline investigative reporter
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, a gorgeous mom disappears after
a family dinner. What happened to Melissa? I Nancy Grace,
this is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us, she.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Said, work one morning and here comes to my dad
walking in the door.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Where's your sister, he said, because we can't find her.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
She didn't show up for Christmas.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
She didn't call your mom and tell her happy Birthday either,
And I was like, wait a minute.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Something's wrong.
Speaker 5 (00:32):
Melissa Wolfenberger, a young, married mother of two, has gone missing.
Her parents are worried thick about her because this is
not like her.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
The kids were her life.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
No way, there's no way she would have ever left them.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
You know. I know it's anecdotal when let me just
say spectators those on the outside looking in here she
would never have left her children. But when you know
the mom, you realize that it's absolutely true that there
(01:17):
is no way she would have willingly left her children.
What happened to Melissa? Joining me in All Star Pedal,
But first I want to go to Melissa's sister, Tina Patten,
also joining us, her mother Norma Patten. To both of you,
(01:40):
thank you for being with us. And also for being
Melissa's voice, because without you, people would forget about her.
I had never even heard about Melissa or her disappearance
until you made it known. Again, thank you for being
(02:00):
with us. I want to go first to you. Melissa's mother,
Norma Patten, tell me about Melissa as a mother. Why
are you so convinced she would never have parted with
her children?
Speaker 6 (02:13):
Because she just she loved her kids. They were the
most precious thing in the world to her. She would
have never left them under any circumstances.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
In addition to Norma, Melissa's mother or Tina is with us,
her sister. Explain to me, why are you so convinced
she would never have willingly left her children? Why she
went back home because of the kids.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
She would have never left them, not for any amount
of time at all.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Again with me, an all star panel. You know, Darryl
Cohen is with me. Former felony prosecutor in inner city Atlanta,
now high profile defense attorney from Cohen Cooper Estephan Allen
in the Atlanta jurisdiction. Darryl see, I understand what Norma
and Tina are telling me, and I agree with them
from what I've now learned about her. It would take
(03:04):
wild horses to drag her away from her family, from
her children. But when you're talking to a jury they've
never met Melissa, you have to have hard examples about
why you know and this is anecdotalis story, it's not
a statistic or a fact that she would never have
(03:25):
done this. I guess the way to do that is
to load your jury with mothers or grandmothers, because they
get it. They know what we're talking about. When we say, oh, hl, no,
Melissa would never have left without them, this is bs,
this is bogus. She didn't just go away and move
to Arizona to start a new life for California. That
(03:48):
did not happen.
Speaker 7 (03:49):
So, Nana, see what you have to do is you
take Melissa. You take her and make her into a
real person, not just a statistic that's something we've seen
on the news. But you talk about her as a mother,
You talk about the wonderful thing she did as a mother,
and on the other side of Jax you say, thank
(04:11):
you very much, I understand, and you accept it, and
then you go on and you still continue to personalize her.
You've got to make her someone that the jury loves
the very beginning, regardless of the facts.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yet, Yeah, cherylmccollum, how do we prove it? Joining me
is Cheryl McCollum, director and founder of the Cold Case
Research Institute Forensics Expert. You can find her at coldcasecrimes
dot org and she is the one, along with the
Patent family, who has spearheaded this and first told me
about Melissa's disappearance. She's host of a brand new hit podcast,
(04:49):
Zone seven. Cheryl, maybe I'm not as I would like
to say to my judges, or let me rephrase that question.
In other words, the witness, what is it telling me?
What I need is jury to hear they what is
wrong with them? So let me rephrase the question to you.
You can't just say to a jury, hey, this mom
(05:11):
would never leave her children. You have to be able
to prove she would never leave her children. I know
it's hard for family members to take in because they're
so upset about the whole thing, But I immediately go to
the evidence. How can you prove this to a jury?
For instance, she never left them alone. She moved from
(05:33):
New York to Atlanta so they could have a better
life and be around their grandparents. She sacrificed one, two, three,
and four for her children. She wouldn't leave them with
a babysitter. Blah blah, blah blah. I've got to have
a way to prove this to a jury. So how
do you prove this was a devoted mother that would
never have left her children, because that is fact number one.
Speaker 8 (05:55):
For me, exactly what you're saying. You paint this picture
of who Melissa was. She left jobs so that she
could stay home with the children. She did not leave
them overnight. Ever, she wanted them with her. She went
out of her way to be with them. She sang
to them, she read books to them, She took them
(06:17):
to visit their grandparents on both sides. She visited with
her sister. She wanted those children with her at all times.
There is no chance she just was walking down the
street and said, Hey, I'm off to California.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Oh hey, Cheryl, you're giving me an idea. Does the
name Drew Peterson ring a bell to you? It should?
Let's see how many wives did he kill? Two that
I know of? Okay, Drew Peterson, police officer, not that
that's here nor there, police officer, and his third wife,
(06:58):
Kathleen Sommio ends up dead in a drowned in a
dry bathtub, her body covered in bruises. Remember that, and
for some reason they rule that an accidental death a
dry bathtub. How do you slip and fall with that
many bruises and a dry bathtub? Why you don't? That's
(07:22):
how you do it? You don't. Then we get to
Stacy Peterson. Well, her body has never been found. But
what did he say when Stacy Peterson left, left her car,
left her children, left her furs and her beautiful clothes
that she had accumulated. She left with a boyfriend? What
(07:43):
on foot? What boyfriend? There was no boyfriend? Or how
many times have you heard she just wanted alone time, meantime.
Speaker 8 (07:52):
That is BS completely BS. And in Melissa's case, the
family only had one car. So how did she get
to California?
Speaker 3 (08:01):
She don't.
Speaker 8 (08:02):
They didn't have EPs for money, they weren't loaded. She
wouldn't have had a way to get to California. She
had no cell phone, she didn't take any clothes, she
didn't take any money, she didn't have a vehicle, she
had no way of contacting any woman. She took nothing
that was precious to her, including her children, it's just
not ring.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
It doesn't range through.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Well, you know all of that is true, but you've
got to be able to prove it to a jury.
And I want to point out something that you just said,
and you're entirely correct, Cheryl McCollum. She gave up a
job to have more time with her children. Now, nobody
was supporting her. She wasn't living off the government, she
didn't have a rich husband, a sugar daddy, nothing, And
(08:45):
she gave up a job in order to be with
her children more and took a job that had horrible hours.
You've heard so many stories about moms working all night,
stocking shelves, working two in three jobs to support their children.
She did that. She did all that and more, giving
(09:05):
up one job that was really good for her so
she could spend more time with her children. So what
do we know. She has a family dinner, then she disappears. Listen.
Speaker 9 (09:17):
Thanksgiving Day, Melissa Wolfenberger makes a visit to her parents,
Carl and Norma Patten. Melissa is excited for the holidays
and asks her mother for a very specific gift. When
Melissa doesn't even call Christmas Day, Norma Patten is unsettled
but Melissa doesn't have a cell phone or a car,
So Norma assumes her daughter is busy with her own
family and we'll pick up her gifts later. When Melissa
(09:37):
doesn't wish her mom a happy birthday two months later,
Norma Patten asks family members if anyone has seen her.
Tina Patton realizes Melissa hasn't worked a shift with her
in months.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Okay, I smell a rat right there. At the beginning.
She goes to this family get together and then she's
never seen again. Now, think about it. She doesn't have
a car, how is she getting around? Somehow? She manages
to take care of her children and get to work.
But then suddenly Tina realizes Melissa's hasn't worked her shift
(10:07):
at a restaurant in months. It hadn't occurred to her before,
but when she began analyzing it, she realized her sister
had not worked at the restaurant for months. It didn't
dawn on anyone. Why should it? But you heard earlier
that she was there and she asked for a specific
(10:29):
gift and then never showed up to get it. What
was the gift?
Speaker 4 (10:34):
Listen, she had asked me for something in particular, and
she said, that was all the only thing she wanted.
And it wasn't something now I could go to the
store and buy. It was something I had to find.
And what it was was a picture of her with
her papa, her daddy father, And that's all she wanted
was that picture. So I found a picture of him
and her together. She was only five years old, maybe
(10:57):
six that the most. I took it and had it
blow up into a night by ten and had it
wrapped up and under the Christmas tree.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
And she didn't.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
Calls, she didn't come get it, you know. And that
was just they wouldn't like her. The kids were her life.
There's no way she would have ever left them. The
girl was three and the little boy was two.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
What happened to Melissa? Now? Just to throw a wrench
in this, just to take the APD Atlanta Police Department's
focus off Missing Melissa, an unrelated skull pops up listen.
Speaker 10 (11:41):
Atlanta PD finds a severede human skull that rolled out
of a ripped trash bag in the middle of Avon Avenue.
Industrial businesses lining one side of the street. The other
is bordered by train tracks. Just over a month later,
four more trash bags are discovered two blocks down Avon
in a wooded area. Inside are a pair of legs
and arms. Police cannot locate it tow ourd soll you know, to.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Justin Scott Morgan, professor forensic's death investigator, with I believe
you said at least one thousand death investigations under your belt?
Is that correct?
Speaker 11 (12:13):
A little bit higher than that?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
But that's okay? Yeah, what do you mean ten eleven hundred?
Just give me a ballpark.
Speaker 11 (12:21):
Probably closer to ten thousand.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Okay. I thought that was me and the number of
pleas and trials I had, but it's actually you. Okay, Wow,
Let that just sink in for a moment. You know,
you can't learn that in the book, although you have
been educated here up to hear ten thousand death scends,
(12:47):
some accidents, some suicide, some natural causes, many of them homicide.
That in mind, your worst work nightmare, I guess, would
be finding ahead a skull, a skull that you cannot identify.
(13:08):
How difficult is that for a death investigator or medical examiner.
You have no torso to connect, You got nothing you.
Speaker 11 (13:17):
Don't You're given very limited, you know, very limited evidence
to draw upon to do an analysis, and people would say,
I think, you know, well, you have a skull, isn't
that enough? No, it's not because without you know, we
think about things in the totality of evidence. What else
is there? Well, what evidence do you have when you
(13:39):
have a bag that has been ripped found in the
middle of a road that contains a human skull, Well,
there's a lot. There's a lot to go on there
relative to this. When you begin to think about an investigation,
how exactly would a skull becomes separated from the rest
of the skeleton. How far along in the decompositional process
(13:59):
is skull You know, that gives us an indication of
how long the skull perhaps was in the back, how
did the bag wind up in the road, and why
is it ripped? You know, you begin to think about
animal activity. You don't necessarily think that some person that
would perpetrate this. And mind you, I'm thinking homicide immediately here,
(14:20):
and that's our one working theory is that all deaths
are homicides until proven otherwise.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Jo Sky Morgan, please stop. I'm not a death investigator
with ten thousand deaths under my belt. I'm certainly not
a medical examiner. But when a skull is found, disattached
from the body and a ripped trash bag out near
the street. It doesn't take an MD to figure out
(14:45):
it's homicide. What the skull does jump into the bag
and threw itself down the street. I mean practically speaking,
of course it's a homicide. And another another thing, how
long does it take? You got to help me verbalize this,
because you're the expert. How long does it take for
I know we say skeleton or skull, but how long
(15:08):
would it take for a skull to become skeletonized? In
other words, you look at the skull and there is
no skin on the no eyes, no hair, nothing to
help you identify it.
Speaker 11 (15:22):
Yeah, assuming that the skull is in fact a skull,
that means that it's absent of any kind of soft tissue,
anything that's left behind that would be connected to the skull.
Just based upon that, the level of heat and exposure,
particularly contained in a plastic bag, is going to potentially
(15:43):
impact that. So it's going to accelerate this event. But
here's the curious thing. The skull was actually recovered in April,
so we're coming out of the cooler month, So that's
going to kind of skew your data a little bit
relative to how long this would have taken. Every single
second counts here, But you're looking to get to the
(16:04):
point of skeletonization. You're looking at this point in tom
probably about at minimum, at minimum eight eight weeks to
perhaps twelve weeks.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
I would think, Okay, listen to more of the forensic evidence.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
Tealafara County calls the Atlanta Police Department and say, hey,
we've got a body down here in a ravine.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
With no head. It might be your guy.
Speaker 5 (16:28):
So the Atlanta Police Department takes the skull, goes to
tel Afara County.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
It's no match.
Speaker 5 (16:33):
Four more trash bags were found near where the skull
was found. Each of those trash bags contained an arm
or a leg no torso. So now in the same
general area we have two arms, two legs, and a skull.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
You know, we recently had a dismembered body where the
body parts were found. Her name Shade Robinson. Beautiful young
girl goes on a date and it's never seen alive again.
And then pedestrians, moms and dads find different parts of
(17:08):
her in different parks, children's parks, all around the area.
And it took some doing to connect the parts together
to figure out these are all from one person. And
now Cheryl McCollum. First is a skull that is in
a ripped trash bag. Then suddenly we find other trash
(17:33):
bags full of several remains, but they're identified as a male.
So that's not helping anything in this case. I find
it really difficult to believe that you have the same
kind of trash bags and you've got a skull in
one and body parts in the others, and they're not related.
(17:53):
They have to be related.
Speaker 8 (17:54):
It is important that this was not a quick problem.
To ever perpetrate this killed this person, then dismembered and
beheaded them, put them into trash bags, and then placed
them somewhere. So you basically had three separate crime scenes
where they were killed, how they were transported to where
they were dump.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
Caerl that I understand you to say chlorox was poured
into the skull, correct.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
So again, why would a cleaning agent be used?
Speaker 8 (18:22):
That's like to clean up something, So that should tell
you something about the perpetrator. You have to factor that in.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
While police are busy with the unidentified male skull and
body parts, the family is still looking for.
Speaker 5 (18:37):
Melissa at the same time that the Atlanta Police Department
is dealing with the unidentified skull. Melissa Wolfenberger, a young
married mother of two, has gone missing. Her parents are
worried sick about her because this is not like her.
They saw her at Thanksgiving, they did not see her
at Christmas or worried as her birthday rolled around. Melissa
(18:57):
had never not contacted her on her birthday.
Speaker 4 (19:01):
We went to Atlanta on Brookline Avenue where they were living.
The house was completely deserted. We talked to some of
the neighbors and they said that he'd moved down of
the house right around Christmas or the first of the year,
and they told us where he was working at. So
we went over there and talked to the owner of
the glass company. At that point we just didn't know.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
And the owner of the glass company tells the family
that the husband we're talking about, the husband, Melissa Wolfenberger's husband,
had been fired and then he disappears. Now Tina and
Norman Patten joining us, the mom and sister Melissa. Tina,
let me understand this. Your sister is there for Thanksgiving.
(19:46):
She asked for a particular picture as a Christmas gift
of her and her grandfather. Then she does to show
up for Christmas. You then start looking for her yourself,
call the restaurant where she works and they tell you
she hasn't shown up for weeks at her shift. And
then at the same time, around Christmas time, he is
(20:09):
far from his job and disappears. Do I have that
timing correct, Tina Patten? Yes, Okay, that's not good. So
police finally track down the husband and this is what happens.
Speaker 10 (20:23):
Christopher Wolfenberger tells detectives he last saw Melissa in Atlanta.
Wolfenberger says the couple always talked about moving the family
to California and starting new lives. Wolfenberger says Melissa decided
to go alone. Wolfenberger says Melissa broke his heart, so
he made no attempt to look for her and assumes
she's living in California under a new name.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Then a stunning twist in the case. While the family's
desperately searching for Melissa, we find out the skull that
was found in the rip trash bag it's not a man,
it's a woman. Share role. Did the medical examiner actually
mischaracterize the skull as a man when it's a woman.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
It was misidentified as a Caucasian.
Speaker 1 (21:09):
Mail Okay, you know, Joe Scott Morgan, how does that happen?
You can't look at a skull and figure out it's
a man or a woman.
Speaker 11 (21:16):
In most cases you can, but it's not completely definitive.
There is a percentage, and this is what these forensic
anthropologists work off of to get these bodies identified. And
I've got to say that not only was it the
medical examiner that was involved in this, quite strikingly, it
was actually the University of Tennessee Body Farm, the anthropology
(21:40):
department there that came to the same conclusion Nancy, which
is absolutely mind blowing to me because this is what
they specialize in.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
And then lo and behold listen.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
One of the first things he realized is where Melissa's
husband worked at Action Glass and where the skull was
found was on the same street, Avon Avenue to the
Atlanta Police Department and says, look, this skull was found
just feet away from where a missing woman's husband works.
So they agreed to get the dental records and have
(22:10):
the medical examiner see if they could identify who that
skull belonged to. On March fourteenth, two thousand and three.
The skull is identified as Melissa Wolfenberg.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Okay, let me understand this straight out to Norma Patten,
who has been looking exhaustively for her daughter, no one
will listen. She said, Oh, she's run off with a boyfriend.
What boyfriend? She'll come back. You knew all along your
daughter would never have left her children. When did you
(22:42):
learn that this skull, which had been misidentified as a
white male is your daughter?
Speaker 10 (22:49):
Brice Jordan.
Speaker 12 (22:52):
From Fayette County. He came to the house to my
home and I walked outside on the porch and I
was told that she had been identified in Atlanta, that
her body had been dismembered.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
What went through your mind? After all the time you
had searched for your daughter and you get this news.
I was devastated completely.
Speaker 12 (23:24):
I screamed and I was crying. My two grandkids that
were here with me came out to find out what
was going on, and.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
I just didn't know what to do. Tina Patton, how
did you discover that all this time your sister had
been dead and her body misidentified as a white male.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
I received a phone call and they said, have you
seen the news? And I said no, and they said, well,
Melissa was found and all they found with her skull?
Speaker 1 (24:06):
What went through your mind? How? How could this happen
to her? And I was just distraught.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
She came in one night with a handprint around.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
The throat, her eyes were red, she had been crying,
and I knew what it was.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It was Chris.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
It was the look in his eyes when I met him.
You could just see the meanness in his eyes.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Melissa didn't deserve what she got. She didn't deserve it.
How could this be? All this time, her family bagging police,
begging other investigators, telling them she's missing. No one took
them seriously. Then, when a dismembered skull and body parts
(24:52):
are found, they're misidentified as a white male. Only later
after a dental record examination, was it discovered those remains
are in fact Melissa. Listen.
Speaker 13 (25:06):
My main focus is on the bags Melissa's body was
placed in. We both know it would be hard to
tie knots, especially in plastic bags, without leaving trace evidence
of some sort. Whenever murder occurs, some kind of evidence
is left. No matter how careful the killer is, evidence
(25:27):
will be there. It may be overlooked, but that does
not mean it's not there. There is no perfect crime.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
That is a letter from Melissa's dad being read by
our friend Walt McCollum, still seeking justice for his daughter.
That's Carl Patten. But what more do we know? We
know that the body the remains were in plastic bags
Joskott Morgan. Plastic bags can be a forensic treasure trove.
Speaker 11 (25:58):
Why well, first off, you can trace them back to
the manufacturer whoever made these things. You can actually get
it down to the run that they came off of
the perforations on each bag. You begin to think about
how they're connected, what type of bag it is. Also,
you know the plastic that you talk about the plastic bags.
(26:21):
One of the things that we look at is that
plastic bags are a non poor surface. So guess what
you can find many times and find latent prints. And
when you look at the knots and the way bags
are tied, think about how you have to manipulate that
bag in order to tie it up. That's why we
have to be very very careful when we're undoing a knot,
(26:41):
for instance, at the crime lab or even in the morgue,
so that we don't destroy any of that evidence, not
to mention if the individual has left any of their
DNA there on that bag, that in fact could kind
of cap off this idea of it being a treasure
trove for forensic evidence exactly.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
And what do we learn from the remains themselves?
Speaker 14 (27:02):
Listen, there were some vertebra that still remained with the head.
It wasn't many, and the vertebra had been sawed through,
and he, you know, he made note of a mechanical
saw that had dismembered the body, at least at that level,
that the tool marks that were left behind were consistent
with something other than a handheld saw. You know, you
(27:22):
think about a carpenter saw or hacksaw or those sorts
of things. That's not what happened in this case.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
The level of violence in this case is overwhelming. Out
to Tina and Norma, I'm sorry to drag you through
more pain, but the fact that we now know a
mechanical saw we believe was used in the dismemberment of
(27:51):
this beautiful young mom, your daughter, your sister. I mean,
how do you go forward? How do you sleep at
night knowing this happened to her? It's really hard to sleep.
Speaker 12 (28:08):
Knowing, well, what was done to her and not knowing
why it was done.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
You know, I wonder sometimes about tell tell signs. Was
there a red flag? Could we tell at the beginning
that this was going sideways? Guys, take a listen to this.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
It was the look in his eyes when I met him.
You could just see the meanness in his eyes. I
didn't like him, and it just it went downhill from there.
He had Melissa climbing out the bedroom window and sneaking
out to go wherever he wanted to go.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
They run away and ended up in Oklahoma.
Speaker 4 (28:56):
The police told me that they caught him driving the
wrong way the interstate, doing one hundred and twenty miles
an hour with no lights on. He went off the
interstate and hit a bull. When they caught up with
him and laughed at him, he said, the only reason
you caught me because I ate that bull. So that's
the way he always looked at everything.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Right at the beginning, I am talking about Melissa's husband.
At the very beginning, he was nothing but trouble. What
about it, Norma.
Speaker 12 (29:30):
He was troubled from day one, and the only reason
I let it.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
My sister kept.
Speaker 12 (29:38):
Telling me that I was fighting it too much. And
I need to let go and just let him have
a relationship.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
And boy do I regret that today. You know, to
Darryl Cohen joining me, former fellow he prosecuted for years now,
veteran trial lawyer at defense attorney, Darryl, did you hear
what tiny was at the beginning? She says? It was
a look in his eyes when I met him. I
could just see the meanness. And I know that that
(30:09):
is not evidence that it would be allowable in court.
I get it, that's totally inadmissible. And if it did
come into court, you, a great trial lawyer, would say
that means nothing. How can she tell he's got meanness
in his eyes? You would make hay it on that
you shred it across examination. But it's true, Darryl. Haven't
you been in the car, say, with your daughter, and
(30:32):
a guy walks up at the red light, and you
go and you lock all the doors. It's a feeling,
it's a gut feeling. It's after thousands of the years
of evolution. That's why the hair sticks up on the
back of your neck or you get chilled. You are
processing something that your brain doesn't understand. And she knew
(30:54):
day one this guy is trouble, Nancy.
Speaker 7 (30:57):
It's not difficult to see that. Times we have a
gut reaction, and usually our gut reaction, the first one
is what we need to go with. But when you
see meanness in somebody's eyes, it's because sometimes you want
to see it. Sometimes he or she just looks evil,
and though it's not admissible, it's how we govern our lives.
(31:18):
It's how we see look at people and say their
body language, their facial expressions, in this case, the eyes
and in this case the eyes told everything. But that
doesn't mean mom or sister can stop it. It just
means you can make your daughter, your sister realize what's
going on. And please be aware. You can't change somebody.
(31:41):
You can't make them do what you want them to do.
Oh my gosh, Nancy, so many times I would love
to tell my daughters, this is what you do. You
know what they would do when I say that? The opposite?
Speaker 5 (32:00):
And how would he risk taking a dead body out
of that house? Number one being unseen when you've got
a neighbor, literally your walls meet, and then drive a
dead body in a car, even if it is just
a short distance, and risk being caught. Then take that
body inside where you've got the privacy, where's all that
blood going. And then you've got to get rid of
that saul because there ain't no way to clean that thing.
Speaker 1 (32:22):
And then you still have.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
To take the body out of that place and dispose
of it.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
And you just do it right there.
Speaker 5 (32:28):
You don't even bother to take it away from where
you're tied.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
To Cheryl McCollum. You and the family have led the
charge and seeking justice for Melissa. When you break it
down that way about what the killer would have to
go through in order to affect this crime, it makes
your blood run cold, Nancy.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
It also is a flag again.
Speaker 8 (32:52):
Who would take that amount of time?
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Who would go get the.
Speaker 15 (32:55):
Trash bags, get a circular saw, get the car ox around,
find a place the dispose of the body that is
great risk to the perpetrator.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
And listen to more more from the letter from dad.
Speaker 13 (33:11):
How do you kill the mother of your two children?
And then you look at those children in the eye
and say your mother deserted you because she didn't want you.
Then when it's proven this mother is dead and they
want us to visit the grave, you take them to
a different location. And claim someone must have moved her.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Oh my stars, did that really happen, Tina. Did the father,
the husband actually tell the children mommy deserted them and
take them to the wrong grave.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yes, it is true.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
He did what happened.
Speaker 16 (33:47):
He just you know, every time their mom was he
would say, she ran off, she didn't want to be
here anymore, so she lived and I'll know where she is.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
So the children grow up thinking, mom, he deserted them,
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (34:02):
Yes, they did.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
To normal patten, did you try to tell them differently?
Speaker 12 (34:06):
We weren't allowed to see them. His mother had custody
of them, and she would not let us see them.
The last time she brought them anywhere around was when
she brought them to the cemetery when we buried Melissa,
(34:27):
And they did not even know that they were at
the why they were at the cemetery, or who it was.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Oh my stars, what a tragedy. So she's murdered, she's dismembered,
and her children are raised thinking mommy abandoned them. Well
in the last days, over twenty five years after Melissa's
(34:57):
dismembered body as found discovered just a block away from
where her then husband worked, an arrest has been made.
Cheryl McCollum explained, you know, they put.
Speaker 3 (35:11):
Together a solid, circumstantial case.
Speaker 8 (35:14):
They went through statement, they went through maps, they went
through body disposal locations, and they narrowed this case down
to one person.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
There wasn't a number one person. There was only one
valuable suspect in this case.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
And that suspect then husband, Christopher Wolfenberger. To you, Nora Patten,
it took so long. It took years for the case
to be solved. What is your response to finally an arrest.
Speaker 12 (35:48):
When I was told that he had been arrested, I
just yelled out as loud as I could, thank you, Bore.
Don't have a long way to go.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
God willing. There will be justice delayed, Yes, delayed, But
in the end, the APD did put the case together.
By now, a cold, cold case. That's hard to do.
Just God, it's really hard to put together a cold case.
It's almost impossible. But they did it, and we finally
(36:27):
have an arrest. How has this affected you, this quest
we've all been on for so long.
Speaker 11 (36:34):
Well for me, God bless them. I see the pain
in the family's eyes, and I've seen this look for
years and years as a death investigator, and it all
brings it flooding back to me now at this point
in my life. It's a touchstone moment, I think, for
them as a family, but it's also a moment in
(36:59):
time where where those of us that are training professionals
moving forward, look at the mistakes that were made along
the way. Where could we have turned a corner that
would have sent us down a different path and not
put the family through so much pain? I think is
what it comes down to. If we all do our
(37:21):
jobs in the beginning, then it's at that point in
time we can look back and understand that we could
save a lot of pain that these families go through.
Because Melissa is not a forgotten person, all right. She's
not just a number that's thrown away. She's a sister,
(37:42):
she's a mother, and she's somebody's baby. And that's what
you have to keep in mind moving forward with all
of this. I just thank God in Heaven right now
that there is some kind, some kind of resolution. It
might not be what we all wanted, but there is
a resolution that we can all grow from at this
(38:02):
point in time. I just hate that it's been done
at the expenses of these precious women.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Tina and Norman Patten. I just really don't have words
to thank you. You are an example for all other
crime victimist families because you never gave up, You never quit.
There were many times Cheryl and I and Joe Scott talked,
(38:27):
We talked about the case, and there were times I
thought there would never be a resolution, there would never
be an arrest, even though we all felt we knew
who was responsible for the murder. The damage to you
and to her children, but most important to her can
never be fixed. There is no fix. But what is
(38:51):
your message today to you, the mother of Melissa Wilsenberger,
What is your message to other crime victims, feens families today.
Speaker 12 (39:01):
Don't give up, Get out there and talk to people,
anybody that you can. We went everywhere anybody had gave
us suggestions. We went, and we You just had to
stay on top of it.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
You can't, you can't let it go. Tina. It was
all consuming your search for justice, your search to find
out what happened to your sister, and there could not
have been more bizarre facts thrown into this quest. What
is your message to other people listening today as we
await a formal announcement.
Speaker 12 (39:42):
No matter what, no matter what happens, what you come across,
what other problems come up, do not take No.
Speaker 16 (39:51):
You've got to push, and when it seems like you're
ready to.
Speaker 1 (39:56):
Give up, keep pushing. Don't stop.
Speaker 13 (40:00):
Stop.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
If Tina and Norma Patten could keep going against all odds,
then so can we. Tina and Norma thank you. We
wait as God willing justice hunfals. Goodbye friend,
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, a gorgeous mom disappears after
a family dinner. What happened to Melissa? I Nancy Grace,
this is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us, she.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Said, work one morning and here comes to my dad
walking in the door.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Where's your sister, he said, because we can't find her.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
She didn't show up for Christmas.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
She didn't call your mom and tell her happy Birthday either,
And I was like, wait a minute.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Something's wrong.
Speaker 5 (00:32):
Melissa Wolfenberger, a young, married mother of two, has gone missing.
Her parents are worried thick about her because this is
not like her.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
The kids were her life.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
No way, there's no way she would have ever left them.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
You know. I know it's anecdotal when let me just
say spectators those on the outside looking in here she
would never have left her children. But when you know
the mom, you realize that it's absolutely true that there
(01:17):
is no way she would have willingly left her children.
What happened to Melissa? Joining me in All Star Pedal,
But first I want to go to Melissa's sister, Tina Patten,
also joining us, her mother Norma Patten. To both of you,
(01:40):
thank you for being with us. And also for being
Melissa's voice, because without you, people would forget about her.
I had never even heard about Melissa or her disappearance
until you made it known. Again, thank you for being
(02:00):
with us. I want to go first to you. Melissa's mother,
Norma Patten, tell me about Melissa as a mother. Why
are you so convinced she would never have parted with
her children?
Speaker 6 (02:13):
Because she just she loved her kids. They were the
most precious thing in the world to her. She would
have never left them under any circumstances.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
In addition to Norma, Melissa's mother or Tina is with us,
her sister. Explain to me, why are you so convinced
she would never have willingly left her children? Why she
went back home because of the kids.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
She would have never left them, not for any amount
of time at all.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Again with me, an all star panel. You know, Darryl
Cohen is with me. Former felony prosecutor in inner city Atlanta,
now high profile defense attorney from Cohen Cooper Estephan Allen
in the Atlanta jurisdiction. Darryl see, I understand what Norma
and Tina are telling me, and I agree with them
from what I've now learned about her. It would take
(03:04):
wild horses to drag her away from her family, from
her children. But when you're talking to a jury they've
never met Melissa, you have to have hard examples about
why you know and this is anecdotalis story, it's not
a statistic or a fact that she would never have
(03:25):
done this. I guess the way to do that is
to load your jury with mothers or grandmothers, because they
get it. They know what we're talking about. When we say, oh, hl, no,
Melissa would never have left without them, this is bs,
this is bogus. She didn't just go away and move
to Arizona to start a new life for California. That
(03:48):
did not happen.
Speaker 7 (03:49):
So, Nana, see what you have to do is you
take Melissa. You take her and make her into a
real person, not just a statistic that's something we've seen
on the news. But you talk about her as a mother,
You talk about the wonderful thing she did as a mother,
and on the other side of Jax you say, thank
(04:11):
you very much, I understand, and you accept it, and
then you go on and you still continue to personalize her.
You've got to make her someone that the jury loves
the very beginning, regardless of the facts.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yet, Yeah, cherylmccollum, how do we prove it? Joining me
is Cheryl McCollum, director and founder of the Cold Case
Research Institute Forensics Expert. You can find her at coldcasecrimes
dot org and she is the one, along with the
Patent family, who has spearheaded this and first told me
about Melissa's disappearance. She's host of a brand new hit podcast,
(04:49):
Zone seven. Cheryl, maybe I'm not as I would like
to say to my judges, or let me rephrase that question.
In other words, the witness, what is it telling me?
What I need is jury to hear they what is
wrong with them? So let me rephrase the question to you.
You can't just say to a jury, hey, this mom
(05:11):
would never leave her children. You have to be able
to prove she would never leave her children. I know
it's hard for family members to take in because they're
so upset about the whole thing, But I immediately go to
the evidence. How can you prove this to a jury?
For instance, she never left them alone. She moved from
(05:33):
New York to Atlanta so they could have a better
life and be around their grandparents. She sacrificed one, two, three,
and four for her children. She wouldn't leave them with
a babysitter. Blah blah, blah blah. I've got to have
a way to prove this to a jury. So how
do you prove this was a devoted mother that would
never have left her children, because that is fact number one.
Speaker 8 (05:55):
For me, exactly what you're saying. You paint this picture
of who Melissa was. She left jobs so that she
could stay home with the children. She did not leave
them overnight. Ever, she wanted them with her. She went
out of her way to be with them. She sang
to them, she read books to them, She took them
(06:17):
to visit their grandparents on both sides. She visited with
her sister. She wanted those children with her at all times.
There is no chance she just was walking down the
street and said, Hey, I'm off to California.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Oh hey, Cheryl, you're giving me an idea. Does the
name Drew Peterson ring a bell to you? It should?
Let's see how many wives did he kill? Two that
I know of? Okay, Drew Peterson, police officer, not that
that's here nor there, police officer, and his third wife,
(06:58):
Kathleen Sommio ends up dead in a drowned in a
dry bathtub, her body covered in bruises. Remember that, and
for some reason they rule that an accidental death a
dry bathtub. How do you slip and fall with that
many bruises and a dry bathtub? Why you don't? That's
(07:22):
how you do it? You don't. Then we get to
Stacy Peterson. Well, her body has never been found. But
what did he say when Stacy Peterson left, left her car,
left her children, left her furs and her beautiful clothes
that she had accumulated. She left with a boyfriend? What
(07:43):
on foot? What boyfriend? There was no boyfriend? Or how
many times have you heard she just wanted alone time, meantime.
Speaker 8 (07:52):
That is BS completely BS. And in Melissa's case, the
family only had one car. So how did she get
to California?
Speaker 3 (08:01):
She don't.
Speaker 8 (08:02):
They didn't have EPs for money, they weren't loaded. She
wouldn't have had a way to get to California. She
had no cell phone, she didn't take any clothes, she
didn't take any money, she didn't have a vehicle, she
had no way of contacting any woman. She took nothing
that was precious to her, including her children, it's just
not ring.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
It doesn't range through.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Well, you know all of that is true, but you've
got to be able to prove it to a jury.
And I want to point out something that you just said,
and you're entirely correct, Cheryl McCollum. She gave up a
job to have more time with her children. Now, nobody
was supporting her. She wasn't living off the government, she
didn't have a rich husband, a sugar daddy, nothing, And
(08:45):
she gave up a job in order to be with
her children more and took a job that had horrible hours.
You've heard so many stories about moms working all night,
stocking shelves, working two in three jobs to support their children.
She did that. She did all that and more, giving
(09:05):
up one job that was really good for her so
she could spend more time with her children. So what
do we know. She has a family dinner, then she disappears. Listen.
Speaker 9 (09:17):
Thanksgiving Day, Melissa Wolfenberger makes a visit to her parents,
Carl and Norma Patten. Melissa is excited for the holidays
and asks her mother for a very specific gift. When
Melissa doesn't even call Christmas Day, Norma Patten is unsettled
but Melissa doesn't have a cell phone or a car,
So Norma assumes her daughter is busy with her own
family and we'll pick up her gifts later. When Melissa
(09:37):
doesn't wish her mom a happy birthday two months later,
Norma Patten asks family members if anyone has seen her.
Tina Patton realizes Melissa hasn't worked a shift with her
in months.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Okay, I smell a rat right there. At the beginning.
She goes to this family get together and then she's
never seen again. Now, think about it. She doesn't have
a car, how is she getting around? Somehow? She manages
to take care of her children and get to work.
But then suddenly Tina realizes Melissa's hasn't worked her shift
(10:07):
at a restaurant in months. It hadn't occurred to her before,
but when she began analyzing it, she realized her sister
had not worked at the restaurant for months. It didn't
dawn on anyone. Why should it? But you heard earlier
that she was there and she asked for a specific
(10:29):
gift and then never showed up to get it. What
was the gift?
Speaker 4 (10:34):
Listen, she had asked me for something in particular, and
she said, that was all the only thing she wanted.
And it wasn't something now I could go to the
store and buy. It was something I had to find.
And what it was was a picture of her with
her papa, her daddy father, And that's all she wanted
was that picture. So I found a picture of him
and her together. She was only five years old, maybe
(10:57):
six that the most. I took it and had it
blow up into a night by ten and had it
wrapped up and under the Christmas tree.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
And she didn't.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
Calls, she didn't come get it, you know. And that
was just they wouldn't like her. The kids were her life.
There's no way she would have ever left them. The
girl was three and the little boy was two.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
What happened to Melissa? Now? Just to throw a wrench
in this, just to take the APD Atlanta Police Department's
focus off Missing Melissa, an unrelated skull pops up listen.
Speaker 10 (11:41):
Atlanta PD finds a severede human skull that rolled out
of a ripped trash bag in the middle of Avon Avenue.
Industrial businesses lining one side of the street. The other
is bordered by train tracks. Just over a month later,
four more trash bags are discovered two blocks down Avon
in a wooded area. Inside are a pair of legs
and arms. Police cannot locate it tow ourd soll you know, to.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Justin Scott Morgan, professor forensic's death investigator, with I believe
you said at least one thousand death investigations under your belt?
Is that correct?
Speaker 11 (12:13):
A little bit higher than that?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
But that's okay? Yeah, what do you mean ten eleven hundred?
Just give me a ballpark.
Speaker 11 (12:21):
Probably closer to ten thousand.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Okay. I thought that was me and the number of
pleas and trials I had, but it's actually you. Okay, Wow,
Let that just sink in for a moment. You know,
you can't learn that in the book, although you have
been educated here up to hear ten thousand death scends,
(12:47):
some accidents, some suicide, some natural causes, many of them homicide.
That in mind, your worst work nightmare, I guess, would
be finding ahead a skull, a skull that you cannot identify.
(13:08):
How difficult is that for a death investigator or medical examiner.
You have no torso to connect, You got nothing you.
Speaker 11 (13:17):
Don't You're given very limited, you know, very limited evidence
to draw upon to do an analysis, and people would say,
I think, you know, well, you have a skull, isn't
that enough? No, it's not because without you know, we
think about things in the totality of evidence. What else
is there? Well, what evidence do you have when you
(13:39):
have a bag that has been ripped found in the
middle of a road that contains a human skull, Well,
there's a lot. There's a lot to go on there
relative to this. When you begin to think about an investigation,
how exactly would a skull becomes separated from the rest
of the skeleton. How far along in the decompositional process
(13:59):
is skull You know, that gives us an indication of
how long the skull perhaps was in the back, how
did the bag wind up in the road, and why
is it ripped? You know, you begin to think about
animal activity. You don't necessarily think that some person that
would perpetrate this. And mind you, I'm thinking homicide immediately here,
(14:20):
and that's our one working theory is that all deaths
are homicides until proven otherwise.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Jo Sky Morgan, please stop. I'm not a death investigator
with ten thousand deaths under my belt. I'm certainly not
a medical examiner. But when a skull is found, disattached
from the body and a ripped trash bag out near
the street. It doesn't take an MD to figure out
(14:45):
it's homicide. What the skull does jump into the bag
and threw itself down the street. I mean practically speaking,
of course it's a homicide. And another another thing, how
long does it take? You got to help me verbalize this,
because you're the expert. How long does it take for
I know we say skeleton or skull, but how long
(15:08):
would it take for a skull to become skeletonized? In
other words, you look at the skull and there is
no skin on the no eyes, no hair, nothing to
help you identify it.
Speaker 11 (15:22):
Yeah, assuming that the skull is in fact a skull,
that means that it's absent of any kind of soft tissue,
anything that's left behind that would be connected to the skull.
Just based upon that, the level of heat and exposure,
particularly contained in a plastic bag, is going to potentially
(15:43):
impact that. So it's going to accelerate this event. But
here's the curious thing. The skull was actually recovered in April,
so we're coming out of the cooler month, So that's
going to kind of skew your data a little bit
relative to how long this would have taken. Every single
second counts here, But you're looking to get to the
(16:04):
point of skeletonization. You're looking at this point in tom
probably about at minimum, at minimum eight eight weeks to
perhaps twelve weeks.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
I would think, Okay, listen to more of the forensic evidence.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
Tealafara County calls the Atlanta Police Department and say, hey,
we've got a body down here in a ravine.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
With no head. It might be your guy.
Speaker 5 (16:28):
So the Atlanta Police Department takes the skull, goes to
tel Afara County.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
It's no match.
Speaker 5 (16:33):
Four more trash bags were found near where the skull
was found. Each of those trash bags contained an arm
or a leg no torso. So now in the same
general area we have two arms, two legs, and a skull.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
You know, we recently had a dismembered body where the
body parts were found. Her name Shade Robinson. Beautiful young
girl goes on a date and it's never seen alive again.
And then pedestrians, moms and dads find different parts of
(17:08):
her in different parks, children's parks, all around the area.
And it took some doing to connect the parts together
to figure out these are all from one person. And
now Cheryl McCollum. First is a skull that is in
a ripped trash bag. Then suddenly we find other trash
(17:33):
bags full of several remains, but they're identified as a male.
So that's not helping anything in this case. I find
it really difficult to believe that you have the same
kind of trash bags and you've got a skull in
one and body parts in the others, and they're not related.
(17:53):
They have to be related.
Speaker 8 (17:54):
It is important that this was not a quick problem.
To ever perpetrate this killed this person, then dismembered and
beheaded them, put them into trash bags, and then placed
them somewhere. So you basically had three separate crime scenes
where they were killed, how they were transported to where
they were dump.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
Caerl that I understand you to say chlorox was poured
into the skull, correct.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
So again, why would a cleaning agent be used?
Speaker 8 (18:22):
That's like to clean up something, So that should tell
you something about the perpetrator. You have to factor that in.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
While police are busy with the unidentified male skull and
body parts, the family is still looking for.
Speaker 5 (18:37):
Melissa at the same time that the Atlanta Police Department
is dealing with the unidentified skull. Melissa Wolfenberger, a young
married mother of two, has gone missing. Her parents are
worried sick about her because this is not like her.
They saw her at Thanksgiving, they did not see her
at Christmas or worried as her birthday rolled around. Melissa
(18:57):
had never not contacted her on her birthday.
Speaker 4 (19:01):
We went to Atlanta on Brookline Avenue where they were living.
The house was completely deserted. We talked to some of
the neighbors and they said that he'd moved down of
the house right around Christmas or the first of the year,
and they told us where he was working at. So
we went over there and talked to the owner of
the glass company. At that point we just didn't know.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
And the owner of the glass company tells the family
that the husband we're talking about, the husband, Melissa Wolfenberger's husband,
had been fired and then he disappears. Now Tina and
Norman Patten joining us, the mom and sister Melissa. Tina,
let me understand this. Your sister is there for Thanksgiving.
(19:46):
She asked for a particular picture as a Christmas gift
of her and her grandfather. Then she does to show
up for Christmas. You then start looking for her yourself,
call the restaurant where she works and they tell you
she hasn't shown up for weeks at her shift. And
then at the same time, around Christmas time, he is
(20:09):
far from his job and disappears. Do I have that
timing correct, Tina Patten? Yes, Okay, that's not good. So
police finally track down the husband and this is what happens.
Speaker 10 (20:23):
Christopher Wolfenberger tells detectives he last saw Melissa in Atlanta.
Wolfenberger says the couple always talked about moving the family
to California and starting new lives. Wolfenberger says Melissa decided
to go alone. Wolfenberger says Melissa broke his heart, so
he made no attempt to look for her and assumes
she's living in California under a new name.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Then a stunning twist in the case. While the family's
desperately searching for Melissa, we find out the skull that
was found in the rip trash bag it's not a man,
it's a woman. Share role. Did the medical examiner actually
mischaracterize the skull as a man when it's a woman.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
It was misidentified as a Caucasian.
Speaker 1 (21:09):
Mail Okay, you know, Joe Scott Morgan, how does that happen?
You can't look at a skull and figure out it's
a man or a woman.
Speaker 11 (21:16):
In most cases you can, but it's not completely definitive.
There is a percentage, and this is what these forensic
anthropologists work off of to get these bodies identified. And
I've got to say that not only was it the
medical examiner that was involved in this, quite strikingly, it
was actually the University of Tennessee Body Farm, the anthropology
(21:40):
department there that came to the same conclusion Nancy, which
is absolutely mind blowing to me because this is what
they specialize in.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
And then lo and behold listen.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
One of the first things he realized is where Melissa's
husband worked at Action Glass and where the skull was
found was on the same street, Avon Avenue to the
Atlanta Police Department and says, look, this skull was found
just feet away from where a missing woman's husband works.
So they agreed to get the dental records and have
(22:10):
the medical examiner see if they could identify who that
skull belonged to. On March fourteenth, two thousand and three.
The skull is identified as Melissa Wolfenberg.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Okay, let me understand this straight out to Norma Patten,
who has been looking exhaustively for her daughter, no one
will listen. She said, Oh, she's run off with a boyfriend.
What boyfriend? She'll come back. You knew all along your
daughter would never have left her children. When did you
(22:42):
learn that this skull, which had been misidentified as a
white male is your daughter?
Speaker 10 (22:49):
Brice Jordan.
Speaker 12 (22:52):
From Fayette County. He came to the house to my
home and I walked outside on the porch and I
was told that she had been identified in Atlanta, that
her body had been dismembered.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
What went through your mind? After all the time you
had searched for your daughter and you get this news.
I was devastated completely.
Speaker 12 (23:24):
I screamed and I was crying. My two grandkids that
were here with me came out to find out what
was going on, and.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
I just didn't know what to do. Tina Patton, how
did you discover that all this time your sister had
been dead and her body misidentified as a white male.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
I received a phone call and they said, have you
seen the news? And I said no, and they said, well,
Melissa was found and all they found with her skull?
Speaker 1 (24:06):
What went through your mind? How? How could this happen
to her? And I was just distraught.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
She came in one night with a handprint around.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
The throat, her eyes were red, she had been crying,
and I knew what it was.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It was Chris.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
It was the look in his eyes when I met him.
You could just see the meanness in his eyes.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Melissa didn't deserve what she got. She didn't deserve it.
How could this be? All this time, her family bagging police,
begging other investigators, telling them she's missing. No one took
them seriously. Then, when a dismembered skull and body parts
(24:52):
are found, they're misidentified as a white male. Only later
after a dental record examination, was it discovered those remains
are in fact Melissa. Listen.
Speaker 13 (25:06):
My main focus is on the bags Melissa's body was
placed in. We both know it would be hard to
tie knots, especially in plastic bags, without leaving trace evidence
of some sort. Whenever murder occurs, some kind of evidence
is left. No matter how careful the killer is, evidence
(25:27):
will be there. It may be overlooked, but that does
not mean it's not there. There is no perfect crime.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
That is a letter from Melissa's dad being read by
our friend Walt McCollum, still seeking justice for his daughter.
That's Carl Patten. But what more do we know? We
know that the body the remains were in plastic bags
Joskott Morgan. Plastic bags can be a forensic treasure trove.
Speaker 11 (25:58):
Why well, first off, you can trace them back to
the manufacturer whoever made these things. You can actually get
it down to the run that they came off of
the perforations on each bag. You begin to think about
how they're connected, what type of bag it is. Also,
you know the plastic that you talk about the plastic bags.
(26:21):
One of the things that we look at is that
plastic bags are a non poor surface. So guess what
you can find many times and find latent prints. And
when you look at the knots and the way bags
are tied, think about how you have to manipulate that
bag in order to tie it up. That's why we
have to be very very careful when we're undoing a knot,
(26:41):
for instance, at the crime lab or even in the morgue,
so that we don't destroy any of that evidence, not
to mention if the individual has left any of their
DNA there on that bag, that in fact could kind
of cap off this idea of it being a treasure
trove for forensic evidence exactly.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
And what do we learn from the remains themselves?
Speaker 14 (27:02):
Listen, there were some vertebra that still remained with the head.
It wasn't many, and the vertebra had been sawed through,
and he, you know, he made note of a mechanical
saw that had dismembered the body, at least at that level,
that the tool marks that were left behind were consistent
with something other than a handheld saw. You know, you
(27:22):
think about a carpenter saw or hacksaw or those sorts
of things. That's not what happened in this case.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
The level of violence in this case is overwhelming. Out
to Tina and Norma, I'm sorry to drag you through
more pain, but the fact that we now know a
mechanical saw we believe was used in the dismemberment of
(27:51):
this beautiful young mom, your daughter, your sister. I mean,
how do you go forward? How do you sleep at
night knowing this happened to her? It's really hard to sleep.
Speaker 12 (28:08):
Knowing, well, what was done to her and not knowing
why it was done.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
You know, I wonder sometimes about tell tell signs. Was
there a red flag? Could we tell at the beginning
that this was going sideways? Guys, take a listen to this.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
It was the look in his eyes when I met him.
You could just see the meanness in his eyes. I
didn't like him, and it just it went downhill from there.
He had Melissa climbing out the bedroom window and sneaking
out to go wherever he wanted to go.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
They run away and ended up in Oklahoma.
Speaker 4 (28:56):
The police told me that they caught him driving the
wrong way the interstate, doing one hundred and twenty miles
an hour with no lights on. He went off the
interstate and hit a bull. When they caught up with
him and laughed at him, he said, the only reason
you caught me because I ate that bull. So that's
the way he always looked at everything.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Right at the beginning, I am talking about Melissa's husband.
At the very beginning, he was nothing but trouble. What
about it, Norma.
Speaker 12 (29:30):
He was troubled from day one, and the only reason
I let it.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
My sister kept.
Speaker 12 (29:38):
Telling me that I was fighting it too much. And
I need to let go and just let him have
a relationship.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
And boy do I regret that today. You know, to
Darryl Cohen joining me, former fellow he prosecuted for years now,
veteran trial lawyer at defense attorney, Darryl, did you hear
what tiny was at the beginning? She says? It was
a look in his eyes when I met him. I
could just see the meanness. And I know that that
(30:09):
is not evidence that it would be allowable in court.
I get it, that's totally inadmissible. And if it did
come into court, you, a great trial lawyer, would say
that means nothing. How can she tell he's got meanness
in his eyes? You would make hay it on that
you shred it across examination. But it's true, Darryl. Haven't
you been in the car, say, with your daughter, and
(30:32):
a guy walks up at the red light, and you
go and you lock all the doors. It's a feeling,
it's a gut feeling. It's after thousands of the years
of evolution. That's why the hair sticks up on the
back of your neck or you get chilled. You are
processing something that your brain doesn't understand. And she knew
(30:54):
day one this guy is trouble, Nancy.
Speaker 7 (30:57):
It's not difficult to see that. Times we have a
gut reaction, and usually our gut reaction, the first one
is what we need to go with. But when you
see meanness in somebody's eyes, it's because sometimes you want
to see it. Sometimes he or she just looks evil,
and though it's not admissible, it's how we govern our lives.
(31:18):
It's how we see look at people and say their
body language, their facial expressions, in this case, the eyes
and in this case the eyes told everything. But that
doesn't mean mom or sister can stop it. It just
means you can make your daughter, your sister realize what's
going on. And please be aware. You can't change somebody.
(31:41):
You can't make them do what you want them to do.
Oh my gosh, Nancy, so many times I would love
to tell my daughters, this is what you do. You
know what they would do when I say that? The opposite?
Speaker 5 (32:00):
And how would he risk taking a dead body out
of that house? Number one being unseen when you've got
a neighbor, literally your walls meet, and then drive a
dead body in a car, even if it is just
a short distance, and risk being caught. Then take that
body inside where you've got the privacy, where's all that
blood going. And then you've got to get rid of
that saul because there ain't no way to clean that thing.
Speaker 1 (32:22):
And then you still have.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
To take the body out of that place and dispose
of it.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
And you just do it right there.
Speaker 5 (32:28):
You don't even bother to take it away from where
you're tied.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
To Cheryl McCollum. You and the family have led the
charge and seeking justice for Melissa. When you break it
down that way about what the killer would have to
go through in order to affect this crime, it makes
your blood run cold, Nancy.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
It also is a flag again.
Speaker 8 (32:52):
Who would take that amount of time?
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Who would go get the.
Speaker 15 (32:55):
Trash bags, get a circular saw, get the car ox around,
find a place the dispose of the body that is
great risk to the perpetrator.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
And listen to more more from the letter from dad.
Speaker 13 (33:11):
How do you kill the mother of your two children?
And then you look at those children in the eye
and say your mother deserted you because she didn't want you.
Then when it's proven this mother is dead and they
want us to visit the grave, you take them to
a different location. And claim someone must have moved her.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Oh my stars, did that really happen, Tina. Did the father,
the husband actually tell the children mommy deserted them and
take them to the wrong grave.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yes, it is true.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
He did what happened.
Speaker 16 (33:47):
He just you know, every time their mom was he
would say, she ran off, she didn't want to be
here anymore, so she lived and I'll know where she is.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
So the children grow up thinking, mom, he deserted them,
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (34:02):
Yes, they did.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
To normal patten, did you try to tell them differently?
Speaker 12 (34:06):
We weren't allowed to see them. His mother had custody
of them, and she would not let us see them.
The last time she brought them anywhere around was when
she brought them to the cemetery when we buried Melissa,
(34:27):
And they did not even know that they were at
the why they were at the cemetery, or who it was.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Oh my stars, what a tragedy. So she's murdered, she's dismembered,
and her children are raised thinking mommy abandoned them. Well
in the last days, over twenty five years after Melissa's
(34:57):
dismembered body as found discovered just a block away from
where her then husband worked, an arrest has been made.
Cheryl McCollum explained, you know, they put.
Speaker 3 (35:11):
Together a solid, circumstantial case.
Speaker 8 (35:14):
They went through statement, they went through maps, they went
through body disposal locations, and they narrowed this case down
to one person.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
There wasn't a number one person. There was only one
valuable suspect in this case.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
And that suspect then husband, Christopher Wolfenberger. To you, Nora Patten,
it took so long. It took years for the case
to be solved. What is your response to finally an arrest.
Speaker 12 (35:48):
When I was told that he had been arrested, I
just yelled out as loud as I could, thank you, Bore.
Don't have a long way to go.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
God willing. There will be justice delayed, Yes, delayed, But
in the end, the APD did put the case together.
By now, a cold, cold case. That's hard to do.
Just God, it's really hard to put together a cold case.
It's almost impossible. But they did it, and we finally
(36:27):
have an arrest. How has this affected you, this quest
we've all been on for so long.
Speaker 11 (36:34):
Well for me, God bless them. I see the pain
in the family's eyes, and I've seen this look for
years and years as a death investigator, and it all
brings it flooding back to me now at this point
in my life. It's a touchstone moment, I think, for
them as a family, but it's also a moment in
(36:59):
time where where those of us that are training professionals
moving forward, look at the mistakes that were made along
the way. Where could we have turned a corner that
would have sent us down a different path and not
put the family through so much pain? I think is
what it comes down to. If we all do our
(37:21):
jobs in the beginning, then it's at that point in
time we can look back and understand that we could
save a lot of pain that these families go through.
Because Melissa is not a forgotten person, all right. She's
not just a number that's thrown away. She's a sister,
(37:42):
she's a mother, and she's somebody's baby. And that's what
you have to keep in mind moving forward with all
of this. I just thank God in Heaven right now
that there is some kind, some kind of resolution. It
might not be what we all wanted, but there is
a resolution that we can all grow from at this
(38:02):
point in time. I just hate that it's been done
at the expenses of these precious women.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Tina and Norman Patten. I just really don't have words
to thank you. You are an example for all other
crime victimist families because you never gave up, You never quit.
There were many times Cheryl and I and Joe Scott talked,
(38:27):
We talked about the case, and there were times I
thought there would never be a resolution, there would never
be an arrest, even though we all felt we knew
who was responsible for the murder. The damage to you
and to her children, but most important to her can
never be fixed. There is no fix. But what is
(38:51):
your message today to you, the mother of Melissa Wilsenberger,
What is your message to other crime victims, feens families today.
Speaker 12 (39:01):
Don't give up, Get out there and talk to people,
anybody that you can. We went everywhere anybody had gave
us suggestions. We went, and we You just had to
stay on top of it.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
You can't, you can't let it go. Tina. It was
all consuming your search for justice, your search to find
out what happened to your sister, and there could not
have been more bizarre facts thrown into this quest. What
is your message to other people listening today as we
await a formal announcement.
Speaker 12 (39:42):
No matter what, no matter what happens, what you come across,
what other problems come up, do not take No.
Speaker 16 (39:51):
You've got to push, and when it seems like you're
ready to.
Speaker 1 (39:56):
Give up, keep pushing. Don't stop.
Speaker 13 (40:00):
Stop.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
If Tina and Norma Patten could keep going against all odds,
then so can we. Tina and Norma thank you. We
wait as God willing justice hunfals. Goodbye friend,
Host
Nancy Grace
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