The Doctor, the Wife, & the Set-Up

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, glad you could make it.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Before you head into the bar for today's True crime story,
just a warning that TCB might contain disturbing content, so
it's not for kids.

Speaker 3 (00:13):
Enjoyed the episode, Welcome to True Crime Brewery.

Speaker 1 (00:19):
I'm Jill and I'm Dick.

Speaker 3 (00:22):
On a quiet dirt road in Brackney, Pennsylvania, two best
friends went skeet shooting in the woods. One would walk away,
but the other would not. Martin Marty Dillon was a
respected attorney, a father, and a husband. That day after
he was shot dead. The tragedy was ruled an accident,
but the truth was far darker. Marty's best friend, doctor

(00:45):
Stephen Cher, told the authorities that Marty tripped while chasing
a porcupine and his gun went off, and then for
two decades they believed him. Join us today for the doctor,
the wife, and the setup. Secrets don't always stay buried forever.
In fact, they seem to have a way of coming
out eventually. This is especially true when a killer marries

(01:06):
his victim's widow and then raises her children as his own.
This is a twisted story of betrayal, obsession, and cold
blooded murder that was hidden in plain sight. So this
was in a small community, very shocking for everyone there.
I think people just had a hard time believing what happened.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
Yeah, well you know you have a respected doctor. Yeah,
these two couples are both upstanding members of the community. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:34):
Well, I don't know about that. I mean, definitely Marty
was a good guy. But we're going to find out
there were some dirty secrets going on in the background.
Oh they certainly were, absolutely, So why don't you give
us a beer review?

Speaker 1 (01:47):
So we're going to have a goza today. Those are
beers that are lighter and alcohol and usually have a
hint of salt. Very refreshing beers, particularly in the summer.
So we're going to do a ghost called Kiirsh goza
from Victory Brewing Company. Kiirsh is German for cherry, I believe.
So it's a dark pink color, lighter pink head, nice

(02:09):
fruity aroma tart, cherry taste, pleasantly salty, good beer to
have for the summer. Well, I mean, I know that
the calendar says it's fall. It's still pretty warm down here.

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Oh. Absolutely, it'll be pretty warm down here until at
least Halloween. Yeah, we hope, right, yeah, okay, Well I
love a ghost, so let's do it. Open it up.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (02:39):
So it does have that nice kind of fruity smell,
and I kind of enjoy the salt as long as
it's not too overwhelming.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
So I don't think it is at all.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
No, I think this could be quite enjoyable and you.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
Can notice it being a little salty, but it's certainly
not dominant.

Speaker 3 (02:55):
No, it's not at all. So how about we settle
in and tell a story, because this is a story.
Oh yes, yeah. I always try and pick a case
that has something interesting, something a little different, because it's
about more than the murder, right, It's about the people,
the community, what was going on, That's what it's all about.
It is yep. So it was actually around noon on

(03:16):
June second, way back in nineteen seventy six, when attorney
Marty Dylan and his client Kendall Strawn finished up a
real estate closing at a bank in Montrose, Pennsylvania. Montrose
is a quiet town near the northeastern tip of the state,
and for thirty year old Marty, the workday was just
coming to a close. Marty took off most Wednesday afternoons

(03:38):
to skeet shoot with friends on some land that his
parents owned. They called it gun Smoke, and it was
about twelve miles outside of town. A group of what
Marty and his friends called the Wednesday Afternoon Club would
take turns shooting clay pigeons, taking breaks for some beer
and some cigarettes. Kendall Strawn didn't live in the area
and wasn't part of the club, but he was a

(03:59):
good friend, and Marty asked him to spend the afternoon
at his family's camp. But Kendall couldn't take the afternoon
off of work. He'd been working seven days a week
managing his properties, and he was running a farm he
owned west of Montrose, so he barely found any time
to spend with his wife, Joan and his baby daughter.
Kendall would recall feeling a touch of urgency in Marty's voice,

(04:22):
but Marty smiled and let it go. So three of
Marty's other friends couldn't make it that day either. This
left Marty with just one member of the Wednesday Afternoon Club,
and that was Doctor Stephen's Cheer, an allergist at Montrose
General Hospital. So Kendall thought he understood the situation that
Marty was dealing with, but since Marty didn't volunteer anything

(04:45):
about it, he didn't ask him when doctor Stephen Schaer's
name was mentioned. Kendall was always careful about saying anything.
He felt like a husband's denial had to be respected
and Marty would eventually come to terms with what was
really going on between this doctor's Chaer and Marty's wife Pat.
So after Kendall drove off, Marty headed to his law office.

(05:07):
Since he returned to his hometown after graduating from law
school just five years earlier, he'd had a partnership with
Robert Dean. This was one of the most respected attorneys
in the county. Marty's practice was very busy. Land prices
in the area had been rising in the early nineteen seventies,
so the economy was really thriving. Marty handled about a

(05:27):
dozen real estate closings per week while his criminal defense
practice was growing. So he was a busy guy.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
Yeah, and it sounds like he's doing pretty well for himself.

Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yeah, just thirty years old, five years out.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Of law school, he's got a job with a very
well respected attorney. Yep, they're clearly going to do well.

Speaker 3 (05:45):
Yes, Now, at his desk. That afternoon, Marty's mood improved
when his secretary, Bonnie Mead, told him he had a
call from Anthony Mmndola. This was an old friend who'd
moved to Florida but was back in town for the week.
Marty and me imediately invited Anthony to go skeet shooting,
but Anthony had a business meeting that afternoon, and then

(06:05):
he had dinner plans. So at this point there really
wasn't anyone left for Marty to ask to go along.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Yeah, he would want so, and he just didn't want
to be by himself with share.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
That's the vibe, right, you're picking up that vibe.

Speaker 1 (06:17):
I'm laying down, that's what you're telling me.

Speaker 3 (06:19):
Yeah, okay, that's right. So as he left for gun
Smoke that day, Marty ran into Pennsylvania State troopers John
Faquette and John Selinka's while he was walking out to
his car, and the three men chatted for a few minutes.
Then Marty got into his red BMW and headed off
half a mile down the street, where he pulled into

(06:39):
the driveway of a white two family house across the
street from Montrose General Hospital. So, grabbing a change of
clothes from his car. Marty climbed the front porch steps
of the home of doctor Stephens Cheer and there was
Shaer standing right in the doorway. So he was kind
of an imposing figure. He was six foot one, two
hundred and forty five pounds.

Speaker 1 (07:01):
That's a bit overweight.

Speaker 3 (07:02):
Yeah, he was overweight and kind of sloppy in appearance.
He was thirty six years old, but he just had
this confidence about him. Some people thought he was arrogant
and they didn't like him at all, But then there
were others in Montrose, especially women, who thought highly of him.
He was recently separated from his wife Anne, so he
had a very active social life. Marty went inside the

(07:24):
home to change out of his suit into the clothes
he'd brought for shooting, some corduroy pants, a blue shirt,
and some boots. If he was oneasy being in the
doctor's home, he seemed to hide it. Well. Maybe he
was just used to it because he'd had plenty of practice.
So today, like so many other times before, it was
just easier to go along with the plans than to

(07:45):
call it off and to have to give it explanation.
So obviously Marty was very non confrontational. Besides, he believed
that the past didn't matter anymore. He was being optimistic.
Just a week earlier, and ultimatum had been given and
a promise had been made, and Marty had felt like
he'd won. So when he walked out of the doctor's house,

(08:06):
even though Cher had already loaded the guns and ammunition
into his own car and was sitting in his driver's seat,
Marty decided to take the first step toward being a
more dominant person in this relationship with Cher. Marty motioned
to his BMW behind the wheel of his sports car.
With Shaer riding as a passenger. Marty felt like he'd

(08:26):
taken back some control, so after a quick stop to
pick up a six pack of Pep's Blue Ribbon, the
two men made a fifteen minute drive, eventually turning onto
Russen Road, and this was a dirt path leading up
the mountain. As they sped past the modest home of
Andrew Russen, a sixty five year old retired mechanical engineer,
Marty beaped his horn once and Russen, who was weeding

(08:49):
in his garden, looked up and waved at him. So
Russin lived there with his wife Anna, and their twenty
one year old mentally disabled son, David, so they kept
an eye on guns for the Dylan family. So they
were pretty friendly. So doctor Cher got out of the
car to open the gate at the entrance to the
Dylan property, and Marty's BMW pulled to a stop in

(09:10):
front of a trailer that was surrounded by woods. The
two men unloaded the car, bringing hamburger meat, ketchup, relish,
bread and chips into the small kitchen for a barbecue
planned for that evening. The trailer was modestly furnished. It
was really just a place to rest, use the bathroom,
maybe have a bite to eat, and have a beer.
So they sat out on the porch, opened beers and

(09:32):
smoked cigarettes for a few minutes. Then the two men
each put a beer in their jacket pockets and walked
a couple hundred feet of a wooded path to a clearing,
carrying the guns, the clay birds, and the skeet machine.
Marty brought along his sunglasses and a pair of gray
and black ear protectors too, so they set up the
skeet at the edge of a field near a tree

(09:53):
stump and took turns shooting ten birds each then they
drank another beer ate some chips, smoked another cigaret. This
was the seventies lot of smoking, right. So it was
just before six pm and Marty reached for the clay birds,
holding one in each hand. His shirt caught the wind,
billowing slightly away from his body. His foot turned inward

(10:15):
as he squatted by the machine, wearing the gray and
black ear protectors and sunglasses. He lowered his head. It
was his turn to load the skee Cher was standing
about four feet away. He reached for a number four shell,
which was much more powerful than the number eights they
ordinarily used for skeat shooting, so he loaded that into

(10:36):
his sixteen gage shotgun, cocked it and took aim. So
the shotgun blast tore into Marty's chest, entering his body
just above his sternum and ripping through his heart. Blood
spattered onto his clothes, the instep of his left boot,
the ear protectors and sunglasses he was wearing, and the
tree stump that was beside him. Micro droplets of blood

(10:58):
were in the air at least five feet around him,
far enough to land on the jeans and boots of
doctor Cher. Then Marty dropped pretty much instantly, face down
onto the ground. This was definitely a deadly shot. Yeah, heart, yeah,
there was no saving him. But the echo of the
gunshot faded and then there was just silence. Cher took

(11:19):
a deep breath. Everything was going according to plan now.
Just weeks earlier, Patricia Dylan, Marty's wife, had ended their
year long affair, and this was after Marty had finally
demanded that she make a choice. She decided she would
stay in her marriage and she would call things off
with the doctor. But now, in the pull of a trigger,
that decision was moot. Now Cher could take what he

(11:43):
believed was his due. He would now have the life
he wanted, the life that had belonged to Marty Dylan.
It was just by chance that Chaer had gotten this
chance to be alone with Marty and a gun out
in the woods. But now as the sun was beginning
to set, Share turned his focus to his own self preservation.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
You know, I'm interested in what would make a man
whose wife had been having a long term affair with
this other guy. Why would you even want to do
anything with the other guy. I wouldn't want to go
shooting skeets with him, No playing basketball or going to
a movie. I wouldn't want to have anything to do
with him.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
Sure, I know, but Marty was just not confrontational at all,
and he was trying to just get along. I mean,
this affair had been going on a long time before
Marty really did anything about it. He was in denial
and maybe just a little bit afraid to say anything.
Possibly so before the state troopers arrived to tape off
the scene, before the coroner was even called, and before

(12:39):
Marty's family was notified, Chaer had to have his story ready.
With a single push, he rolled Marty's body onto his back.
He laid down the sixteen gage Winchester several feet away,
with the muzzle pointed toward his victim's head. Then he
bent over and untied Marty's right shoelace. As he prepared
to leave, he reached into Marty's pocket and took his

(13:02):
car keys.

Speaker 1 (13:03):
So at first Andrew Russen didn't recognize Cher standing at
his door. The Russins didn't get many visitors. Living way
up at dirt and gravel Road in Silver Lake Township,
Russen hadn't heard the BMW pull into the driveway, but
he heard Chaer. There was an accident and Marty's dead.
His voice, though, was flat and expressionless. He was shot now.

(13:24):
Russin liked Marty, and the doctor's story was hard to believe.
Cher told him he had tried giving mouth to mouth
resuscitation and he had a ring of blood around his mouth.
Then he told Russein to call for help. As Chare
waited in the kitchen. Russin phoned the emergency number and
reported an accident at gun Smoke. Then Cher asked him
to return with him to the Dylan property, and Ruskin agreed,

(13:47):
telling his son David to join them. Rustin and his
son followed the BMW driven by Stephen Cher In Russin's
nineteen sixty six white jeep about a half mile up
the road. At the turn for gun Smoke, Rustin stopped
and told David to get out and wait at the
corner for the ambulance and Andrew Russin drove about a
mile and a half to the Dyllan trailer and they
followed the doctor by foot up the dirt path. At first,

(14:09):
russen could only see a pair of boots, but as
he continued up the slide upgrade, the crumpled figure on
the ground came into view. The two men stood over
the body. He fell in his gun. Doctor Cher said
he shot himself, and Andrew Russen nodded. He had no
reason to question the doctor, Well he didn't.

Speaker 3 (14:25):
He didn't even know the doctor, so why would he
question it. He took the blanket his wife had given
him and he did cover Marty's body. Chier walked up
behind him, and out of the corner of his eye,
Russen saw him picking up the sixteen gage Winchester. So
as Russin watched, the doctor lifted the gun by the muzzle,
raised it up like a baseball bat, and with full force,

(14:47):
he swung it directly into a tree. He broke it
into two pieces, cracking it and sending it flying more
than twenty feet away. This goddamn gun will never kill again,
he shouted. So A shocked and confused Andrew Russen only
stared at the doctor. This behavior was just weird, But
he did sigh with relief that the gun had not

(15:07):
discharged accidentally, you know, for a second time that day.

Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, it seems kind of remarkable.

Speaker 3 (15:14):
That he did that, that he did that. Yeah, it
was definitely an act, thinking he was going to destroy
some evidence or something like that. Absolutely that's the first thing.

Speaker 1 (15:24):
I thought of, and it is a good act or
a good scene. Yeah, the gun.

Speaker 3 (15:28):
Killed him, so I'm going to kill the gun right right, Yeah,
it was really dramatic, I would guess. So at that point,
the first EMTs Don and Susan Strope arrived on the scene.
It had been Susan Strope who'd taken Russen's call on
the emergency phone that she had installed in her own home.
So talk about a small town, right, I guess. So

(15:50):
this had broadcast over the radio a request for first
responders to head over to the scene. Once a gun smoked,
Don Strope jumped out as his wife parked by the trailer.
When he reached the crest of the incline and saw
the two men leaning over a body, one of them
with his face and hands bloody, Strope quickly turned and
held up his hand for his wife to stay back.

(16:11):
He told her to help share. So the doctor walked
along the trail towards Susan Strope and then turned and
buried his face against a tree. He wrapped his arms
around the trunk and began to cry. Susan Strope touched
him gently on the shoulder, and she identified herself, explaining
that she was with the rescue squad. She asked what
she could do to help, and he said he was

(16:33):
having chest pains. So he's gasping and sobbing. He says
he has chest pains, so Susan Strope is concerned, and
she asked him if he had a heart condition. He nodded.
When she asked if he had any nitroglycerin pills, he
told her he'd already taken two. I'm a doctor, he explained,
I'm Doctor Cher. Susan Strope had heard the name, but

(16:54):
she'd never met Share before. She led him to her
car and motioned for him to sit in the passenger seat.
When Cher saw the coroner arrive, then he began to cry.
The tears came like full force. My best friend, he moaned.
I can't believe he's dead. He was my best friend.
So less than an hour after Stephen Cher shot Marty Dillon,

(17:14):
the doctor felt like, yeah, I think I'm in the clear.
His story in tears had been enough for John Connerton,
that was the coroner. He was sold and over the
next half hour other officials arrived on the scene. So

(17:50):
the moment the coroner and a state trooper met up
on the path. The coroner confidently shared exactly what doctor
Cher had told him happened. It's an accidental shooting, the
werner said. The trooper, who was a rookie, didn't even
ask any questions. He'd never even been to the scene
of a shooting before. As he followed the coroner up
the trail, he learned that the distraught man sitting in

(18:12):
the Strope's car was doctor Stephen's cheer and he had
been the only other person at gun Smoke at the
time of the shooting. But the coroner said, hey, this
is all quite simple. Marty trip he fell and shot
himself in the chest. It was an accident. At the scene,
the trooper assumed jurisdiction for the Pennsylvania State Police, taking
over from the game wardens, and he cordoned off the area.

(18:35):
He walked over around the body. He saw the black
and gray ear protectors and a pair of sunglasses that
were streaked with blood lying a few yards away. He
saw the broken gun, the pump handle six feet from
the body, and the stock another twenty five feet away. Nearby,
he could see a tree stump that was spattered with
blood and a second firearm a double barreled shotgun on

(18:59):
top with no rounds in either barrel. He saw that
Marty's right shoelace was untied, and he asked Bob Elliott
to clear the chamber of the Winchester. This was a
game warden, and he did what he was told. He
removed the number four shot expended cartridge from the barrel
and at number eight shot on expended cartridge from the magazine,

(19:20):
but nobody asked about that. The trooper asked Schaer to
follow him to his police car, and he did, getting
into the passenger seat. The trooper and the coroner climbed
into the back seat, and the trooper pulled out a
pen and a pad of paper, asking Cher to tell
him exactly what had happened that day.

Speaker 1 (19:37):
Shere began to speak. He said, they were walking down
the trail and he laid his gun on the stand
they passed coming down the trail. As they went a
little farther, Marty turned around and he saw something in
the open field, and that it might have been the
porcupine that his dad had been after. Cher said that
Marty ran up the trail, grabbed his gun from the stand.
He heard him cock it. Then he heard the gun

(19:58):
go off, so he went up path. He saw Marty
lying on the ground, face down. He ran up to
him and turned him over. So, I'm bleeding from his chest,
he said. He tried to stop the bleeding and gave
Marty mouth to mouth, but he knew he was dead. Yeah,
he's a doctor.

Speaker 3 (20:13):
Yeah. And then after that he turned to the coroner,
who was nodding along John. He said, I'm a doctor.
I knew he was dead. Then I turned and started
running down the trail, and I started to get chest pains,
so I turned around and I went back to get
the car keys out of Marty's pocket. I then drove
to the Russan's place and told them what had happened.
Then me and Russen came back, and I took him

(20:34):
to where Marty was. I looked down and saw the
gun and I picked it up and said, the goddamn
trigger got a twig in it. And at the same time,
I smashed it against the tree. I know I shouldn't
have done that, but you know the message there was
he was just so emotional he couldn't help himself. So
his was a description of events that would ring hollow
for those who understood guns and the trajectory of bullets,

(20:58):
also for those educated in blood set batter and crime scenes.
But mostly the story of the porcupine in the woods
and of Marty grabbing the doctor's gun off the stand
and running with a loaded gun would immediately arouse suspicion
in those who knew Stephen Cher and Marty Dylan. In
the days that followed, as Cher repeated his account of
that evening to friends, family, and authorities, the facts would change.

(21:22):
They were small details, but that's how lies tend to work.
They change a little bit. It would solidify the belief
in many people that something very different than Cher had
described had actually happened that day. For the next hour
or so, the trooper, the coroner, and the game wardens
continued to walk from the body to the trailer. They
were taking measurements and photos and talking. Share waited quietly

(21:45):
by the cars, so while the authorities were up at
the clearing, he felt like he could relax. He must
have thought he was hidden from judgmental eyes. But he
was wrong, because Carol Gazda was watching him. A volunteer
first aid tich Nission She had been sitting in her
car parked a few yards away from Chaer for more
than an hour. She'd arrived shortly after the stropes. She'd

(22:08):
heard the call over the radio and immediately headed over,
taking along her five year old daughter. But when Carol
Gazda got to gun Smoke and began walking up the path,
she saw that her husband Tom was already on the scene.
He saw her and waved her away, telling her to
keep their daughter back from the crime scene. So Carol
had grabbed her daughter's hand and led her back to

(22:30):
the car, and she waited there, having really no idea
what was going on. She didn't know who any of
the people there were. She'd never met Marty Dylan or
Stephen Chaer. But Carol watched Shar's odd behavior. So he
was a man sitting quietly and calmly, looking as if
nothing was wrong. But then someone would come out from
inside a trailer or from up the path, a trooper,

(22:53):
the coroner, or an EMT, and the man in front
of her, almost as if on cue, would suddenly begin
to cry, and he'd sob my best friend. He was
my best friend. So for a little more than an hour,
Carol had watched Cher turn off and on at least
half a dozen times, calm went alone and breaking down
as soon as anyone approached him. It was just the

(23:15):
strangest thing Carol had ever seen. She felt like she
was invisible. She was the only witness to this behavior,
and for some reason, Chaerre didn't notice her sitting in
her car. But you know, she really didn't have any
idea what she was seeing until later. She just felt
like something was wrong.

Speaker 1 (23:32):
Well, yeah, if you're watching a person for a time
length a time and he's doing the actions that shared did,
that's really suspicious. I mean he's calm and relaxed almost
until someone comes from the site and then he's sobbing
uncontrollably exactly. Yeah, good actor.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Well I don't know how good it was, but he
wasn't afraid to do it anyway, right, he had some
nerve that he did so really, by all accounts, Stephen
Chare had charm and he'd have this ability to gain
people's trust just in general. The only disagreement between his
friends and detractors was whether he was being genuine. So

(24:09):
Sha had been born to Jewish parents in Toronto, Canada.
His sister, Susan was two and a half years younger
than him. When he was eight, his family relocated to
Florida for his father's job as a salesman. But three
years later, out of town on a business trip, Sher's father,
just in his early forties, died of a massive heart attack,
and the death really hit the family hard. The Shares

(24:32):
had to move into a small apartment, and young Stephen
began to work after school. Then within two years there
were more major adjustments to make His mother remarried and
he had a new stepfather and two new step brothers.
For as long as he could remember, he'd wanted to
become a doctor, and then after his father's death, his

(24:52):
determination only became stronger. He got good grades in high
school and he was able to become a US citizen
at age six. Then he enrolled at the University of Miami,
but just a month after school began, Cher's mother died
of cancer. Without any other family members in the area,
he and his sister left Florida. Susan went to live

(25:15):
with an aunt in Toronto, and Stephen transferred his credits
to the University of Michigan, so he moved in with
an uncle who lived near Ann Arbor, but it was
a very difficult time for him. Losing both of his
parents so young had left him feeling adrift, with few
friends and pretty much no money. He immersed himself in
his courses. Then one night he went to a university

(25:37):
dance and he met Edna Anne Elias, a bacteriology student.
They dated and soon they were a couple. So Cher
was accepted at the university's medical school, and one year
later he and Anne, both twenty three years old, got married.
They rented a farm outside of anne Arbor. Anne paid
the bills and Share worked part time at the same clinic.

(26:00):
After med school, he started to consider job offers in
small communities where he could build his own family practice.
Both of them preferred to live in the country, and
they agreed to focus on the East Coast. Anne wanted
somewhere where she could raise her dogs. She liked to
raise and train and show dogs, so they ended up
moving to Montrose, Pennsylvania. With a guaranteed income, the Shares

(26:23):
bought a farm on the periphery of the town. They
shared a common interest in medicine, and they would discuss
the latest journals together. Cher took over another physician's practice
in New Milford, which was just about nine miles away,
so he had two practices. He was working, so he
was working long hours and making house calls in the mornings,

(26:43):
staying late into the evenings in his office. Some people, though,
found him to be cold and distant. Still, others liked him,
but everybody really agreed that he was devoted to medicine.
But then a lot like his father. He had a
heart attack when he was just thirty one. That's pretty young,
very young. But he did not live a healthy lifestyle either.

Speaker 1 (27:04):
No, he it's two hundred and fifty pounds smoker. Have
you smoked, smoker? Yep.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
So he spent three weeks recovering, and once he went
back to work, Anne noticed some big changes in her husband.
He did lose some extra weight and stop smoking, but
he also began to avoid having sex with her. She thought, well,
maybe he's afraid he'll have a heart attack if we
have sex. Then he started to talk about his belief
that he would probably die young, just like his parents.

(27:30):
Anne believed his reaction to his fear was for him
to focus only on himself, his own needs and what
he wanted. She later told friends it was as if
he'd made the decision that he was going to do
whatever he wanted to do because his life was going
to be short anyway, So it was really as if
he took a dangerous turn and he started trusting no one.

(27:50):
She was aware that her husband was a master at
controlling situations and at manipulating people. She also knew that
he had frequent mood swings. He would just turn cold
with no explanation. Then Cher began to treat her with
a coldness that just stunned her, gradually just tearing down
her self esteem. He told Anne not to visit him

(28:12):
at the clinic anymore. He would leave home on weekends
to go bowling or play golf and not even tell
her he'd just go. Some nights he didn't come home
at all. For a while, Anne held out hope that
her marriage might get better. She hadn't been able to
get pregnant, although at one time they had talked about adopting.
But as the distance grew between them, Anne really sunk

(28:33):
into depression. Cher would sometimes bring her sedatives and antidepressants
from the hospital, but nothing seemed to help, and that's
probably not the best way to go about it. She
probably should have gone to a doctor and a therapist.

Speaker 1 (28:47):
Yes, but that's not the way to try a course
of antidepressants. No, of course, not take it for a
week and say it's not working. Try something different.

Speaker 3 (28:55):
No, right, And still he was abusive. He was complaining
that the house was messy, and it cut to the
point where he really couldn't stand the dogs. So the
marriage was in trouble. Then Pat Dylan joined the nursing
staff at Montrose General Hospital, and I think this is
when they really started getting the affair going least starting

(29:15):
to build like a flirtation and a friendship. So pat
was petite with a soft voice and dark hair. She
just returned to the area with her husband and their
infant son after spending years in the Philadelphia area. So
Patt had grown up as the adored daughter of John,
a math teacher at her high school, and Laura, a

(29:36):
homemaker who was known as a great cook. Patty was
an only child until she was twelve, when her parents
adopted a son, Robbie. So the family, the Carvellers, were
staunch Catholics who attended church regularly, and they lived in
a large, white shingled house with a big barn. Although
the neighborhood did have a lot of children, Patty rarely

(29:57):
played with any of them. She had a small cule
of friends and spent most of her time with her
closest friend around the neighborhood. It was well known that
Patty was spoiled by her parents, and her nickname was
Laura's Little Princess, Laura being her mother. So as she
entered her teens, Patty continued to distance herself from most
of the young people in Montrose. They started to consider

(30:20):
her to be a snob who looked down on them.
As a teen, she was beautiful with long brown hair
flipped at the ends, kind of like a net Funicello.

Speaker 1 (30:30):
Probably of our audience will not.

Speaker 3 (30:32):
Know, and net Funicello is right. Yeah, Well, she was
a star one like in the fifties. She was in
the Mickey Mouse Club. She was kind of a big deal,
that's right. But Patti seemed to have it all. It
was her mom who encouraged her to study nursing, and
that was the way she hoped her daughter would find
a husband, and not just any guy. But she wanted

(30:54):
Patty to marry a doctor and really nothing else would
be good enough. After graduating from high school, Patty attended
the university of Pennsylvania School of Nursing in Philadelphia. But
Patty didn't fall in love with a medical student. Instead,
she began to date Marty Dylan, and this was a
guy she'd known from high school, where he'd been one

(31:15):
great ahead of her. This wasn't what her mother had planned,
but she did like Marty. He was handsome, and he
was ambitious, and he had dreams of becoming a Riald lawyer.
So I guess that wasn't so shabby. Yes, Patty's mom
was okay as long as a professional, right, Somebody who's
going to make money and have some status in the
community was pretty much what Laura wanted. So Marty was

(31:39):
born to Larry Dillon, a shipyard worker, and his wife
Joe in Delaware. After the birth of their son, the
Dylans moved to Montrose, and there Larry sold cars, delivered gasoline,
and performed other odd jobs. Two years after Marty was born,
the Dylons had a daughter they named Joanne. The Dillons
didn't have a lot of money, but they were a

(32:01):
tight knit family who enjoyed spending time together. From early childhood,
father and son were really good friends. Larry taught Marty
how to hunt always stressing safety first, so that is significant,
and Marty took these lessons seriously. Marty and his sister
were also close. In high school, Marty played basketball and

(32:22):
trombone in the band, and he was even elected class president.
After school, he worked at the local agway, stocking shelves
and sweeping the floors. But Marty's real passion was always
fast cars. After school, he loved drag racing with his
friends outside of town. When he was done with high school,
Marty enrolled at Villanova University near Philadelphia. He worked hard,

(32:45):
and he set his sights on law school. When he
and Patty became serious, the Dylans were really happy. Joanne
had always wanted a sister, and now she felt like
she had one. Marty and Patty were married a week
before Marty entered law school, and the newlywed settled into
an apartment in Philadelphia while Marty attended law school and

(33:06):
pat took a nursing job. The early years of the
Dylan marriage really seemed ideal. Patty became pregnant and at
the start of Marty's last semester of law school, their
first child, Michael, was born a few months later. After
Marty graduated the family decided to move back to Montrose. So, hey,

(33:36):
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(33:56):
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Speaker 1 (34:48):
A year after they moved back home, the young couple
bought a three bedroom ranch home and a new development.
Marty put in long hours at Bob Deane's law firm,
and in the evenings he's sometimes dropped by the mantos
En to hang out with friends, have a few drinks, relaxed,
and at first Patty seemed to be finding her niche
as well, arranging dinner parties and making contacts with established

(35:09):
young couples. She also took a part time nursing job
at the hospital, but before long something seemed to be
missing for Patty. Marty was busy all the time, distracted
by work, and he did not dote on her the
way she had grown up believing a man would, and
though she tried to fight it at first, she found
herself becoming more attracted to a man who gave her
the attention she needed and who would that be. At first,

(35:32):
Patty Dillan and doctor Stephen Schaer were friends, Cher met
Marty and for a while the two men seemed to
be good friends. When Marty remodeled his basement into a
wreck room, share stopped by to help. But by the
fall of nineteen seventy two nurses at the hospital noticed
flirting and whispered conversations between Steve and Schaer and Patty Dillane.

Speaker 3 (35:54):
And by this time Patty was expecting her second child.
As her pregnancy progressed, the nurses would watch as doctor
Cher would follow Patty around the hospital. Cherer started to
drop by her house in the mornings after Marty had
left for the office. Marty went along with Pat's suggestion
that they socialized with the Shares as couples, going to

(36:16):
hockey games or out to dinner at the Montrose Inn. Now,
Marty appeared not to notice that when the foursome were
together it seemed like step and Patty were the couple
whispering and laughing together. But Anne Cher did notice, and
she did not like it. From the start, she accused
her husband of having an affair with the nurse, and

(36:37):
he denied it. So by this point, miserable Anne Cher
lashed out at her husband, who was really just ignoring
her at this point. Occasionally he enjoyed making remarks just
to increase her jealousy and to hint at his role
as an almost surrogate father to little Michael Dillon. He
would mention that he was helping Patty Potty train her son,

(36:59):
or they he was taking him out to teach him
to ice scape. So this was all very strange.

Speaker 1 (37:04):
Oh strange, yes, very.

Speaker 3 (37:06):
Calculated, absolutely so. Feeling absolutely powerless, an sank deeper into depression.
Chaer continued to insinuate himself into Marty's family. It was
never clearer than when Patty gave birth to her daughter
that Cher was in love with her. When word of
the birth of Suzanne Dillon reached the hospital, doctor Cher

(37:28):
immediately announced that he had to go and see the baby.
I'm her pediatrician, he told the nurses, and he practically
ran out of the hospital. The nurses just kind of
looked at each other, like, what the fuck, what's going on?
It was just crazy. He was not subtle in the least.

Speaker 1 (37:43):
No, he wasn't.

Speaker 3 (37:44):
So the receptionist and the switchboard operator that night just
couldn't contain her shock. The hospital was filled with patience,
and the only doctor who'd been on duty had just
walked out. So she'd been observing the relationship between Scher
and Patty, and she had not liked what she saw.
She didn't care for doctor Share, She found him to
be pompous. She really wasn't fond of Patty either. Now

(38:07):
they had grown up next door to each other, joe
Anne saw Patty the same way as she'd been as
a child. Pleasant but someone who thought she was just
a little better than everyone else. Joe Anne and many
of the nurses shared their disbelief about the relationship between
doctor Shar and Patty. The doctor was overweight and dressed
really sloppily. Nurses even whispered about his body odor and

(38:31):
his dirty fingernails. They couldn't understand what they really put together.
Pretty Patty saw in this guy. But Patty Dylan liked
something she was getting from share, possibly the attention she
craved in the adoration that she was given as a child.
She was headed down a dangerous path, though, and Marty
Dillon refused to see what was happening. So by nineteen

(38:54):
seventy four, Cher was arranging Pet's schedule so that they
worked the same shifts. When he was on call, he'd
leave the receptionist a phone number where he could be reached,
so at first the receptionist didn't know whose number it was.
Then she called one day and she recognized Pat's voice.
So the whispers about Shar and pat were just all

(39:16):
over the hospital. Anne Scher was hearing the rumors too,
so she began to check up on her husband, and
of course it did not take long for her to
find out about his lies.

Speaker 1 (39:27):
Right, well, he wasn't being real careful about covering him up. No, no, no, well,
one thing he'd do. He said he's going to Syracuse
for medical meeting, and Anne could see that by the
odometer on its car that he hadn't driven anywhere. One Sunday,
when Cher told her he was working at the clinic,
Ann called to speak to him. Receptionist Joanne Warner took

(39:48):
the call. Ordinarily, she passed calls from wives directly to
the doctor's so when Anne Share called, she just told
her the phone number Share had given her where he
could be reached, and Anne recognized the Dylan's phone number.
She'd made lunch for her husband that day, but he'd
never shown up and drove to the clinic and waited
in the parking lot. Word traveled throughout the hospital that
trouble was coming. When shares A car finally pulled into

(40:10):
the lot, the nurses listened to Ann Share confront her husband.
Good theater this, I'll bet.

Speaker 3 (40:15):
Oh yeah, this is just some great drama. It's like
a soap opera right just about if it weren't real
people's lives being destroyed, it would have just been entertaining.
But a lot of the people were upset because they
knew that people were being hurt by this, and it
just wasn't appropriate at all. So in early nineteen seventy five,
Scher decided to specialize in allergies, and that's when he

(40:38):
asked pat to be his nurse. So once they were
having a sexual relationship, their behavior was just becoming even
more obvious. They were kind of like teenagers who couldn't
get enough of each other. But still Marty refused to
face the truth. He put in longer hours at the
office and began spending more time going to races on

(40:58):
weekends and drinking with his friends at the Montrose Inn.
He knew there was something wrong in his marriage, but
he just could not imagine Patty being unfaithful to him.
At the same time, Marty was just as confused by
Cher's behavior. It was just difficult to believe that Cher,
who called him for lunch, dropped by his office to chat,

(41:19):
and sometimes joined him skeet shooting, would be sleeping with
his wife behind his back. To Marty, he just couldn't
believe anyone would do that.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
Oh yeah, a good friend. Maybe not best friend, but
they're pretty good friends.

Speaker 3 (41:32):
Pretty good friends, and they were friends as couples too.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (41:36):
So yeah, it was very disturbing, but Marty just took
a long time to face up to it. His friend
Kendall Strawn, though, really seemed to pick up on it
much earlier. His curiosity about Pat and Scher being together
had been growing when Marty mentioned that his wife and
the doctor were planning to go to a medical conference
out of town. Kendall just knew something was weird about that,

(42:00):
but since Marty didn't really seem concerned, Kendall shrugged it off.
His suspicions really increased in the winter of nineteen seventy five,
and that's when Pat called him and encouraged him to
go with Marty to a race in Florida. Then, on
the morning they were leaving, Marty told him that Pat's
back was bothering her and doctor Cher had come by

(42:20):
the house to put her in traction. Yeah, so they're
leaving town and this guy's come into the house.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Ye.

Speaker 3 (42:28):
Kendall did not buy this at all. He actually sought
out Pat and he asked her about her back. He
was very suspicious and she seemed nervous and wouldn't look
him in the eye, so he knew right then she
was lying. His suspicions were confirmed that day. It was
the spring of nineteen seventy five, and the full blown

(42:48):
affair was under way for months. Sharon pat told their
spouses they were going to an allergy conference in Canada.
Marty helped Loada's wife's suitcase into SHA's car, but Anne
Scherer begged her husband not to go. She pleaded with
him to give their relationship another chance, but Cher didn't
even answer her, and he just continued to pack for

(43:10):
the trip. As his wife was becoming almost hysterical, he
just coldly walked out of the house. Then later that day,
in the bathroom, Anne found a vial of about forty
yellow capsules of nembutah.

Speaker 1 (43:23):
It's a barbituate. I think a more of an intermediate
acting one, so.

Speaker 3 (43:28):
Kind of a sedative, definitely. So she'd never seen these
pills in the house before and she didn't take them,
but she really believed that her husband had left them
hoping that she'd take them in like a suicidal attempt.
He just wanted to get rid of her and did
not care one bit, just did not give one shit
about her at all.

Speaker 1 (43:46):
Well, probably forty capsules would.

Speaker 3 (43:48):
Do it, absolutely, I would think so. So Anne Scher
just cried all through that weekend, And meanwhile, in Canada,
her husband took Pat to meet some of his relatives
in Toronto. In July, the Shares and the Dilans went
to a resort in Wyoming where Pat and Cher were
supposed to attend another allergy seminar. Before they left Montrose,

(44:10):
Anne asked her husband what she'd been wanting to for months.
She said, are you in love with Pat Dylan? And
he wouldn't admit it that day, but he soon would.
During this trip with the four of them, Marty ran
into Anne near the swimming pool one day, and Marty
looked at her sadly and said, don't go over there.
Anne went anyway, and she quickly saw what Marty had

(44:32):
just seen. Her husband and Marty's wife were reclining on
beach chairs by the pool, and Cher was massaging Pat's legs.
Anne hurried back across the grass and Marty told her
he wanted to return to Montrose, so he was trying
to get different plane reservations because he wanted to get
Pat out of there, he said. After the Shar's returned

(44:53):
to Montrose, Anne asked her husband again if he was
in love with Pat, and this time he said he was.
Month later, Chaer told his wife that he'd filed for
divorce and that Marty was his lawyer. He told her
the proceedings would be handled fairly and she didn't need
her own attorney. Oh sure, but none of it Anne
later learned was true, big surprise. She couldn't understand why

(45:17):
Marty would have agreed to handle the divorce anyway, and
she later decided this was a ploy just to keep
her from talking to Marty and sharing her suspicions that
their spouses were having an affair.

Speaker 1 (45:28):
Well, yeah, but by this time it's fairly common knowledge.

Speaker 3 (45:32):
Yeah, but Marty's in denial still. Yeah. It was actually
Bob Dean, Marty's associate, who filed the divorce papers for Share.
Even after he announced he was divorcing Anne, Cher didn't
leave their farm for two months. Sometimes Anne thought he
was trying to just make her go crazy. He finally

(45:52):
left the day before Thanksgiving and said to her, I'm
going to reduce you to living in a rented room
in Binkham. I don't know what's wrong with Binghamton, but
he said, you'll be working the night shift flipping Hamburgers
at McDonald's.

Speaker 1 (46:06):
Oh, it's a town in New York state.

Speaker 3 (46:08):
Well, I guess he thought it was a bad place.
It was a threat. But why would she be flipping hamburgers?
This was an educated woman. He was just belittling her
so horribly. At the hospital, the nurses were just amazed
by how the couple was behaving. A nurse's aide assigned
to Pat had never liked working for Pat and Share.
She told others she felt like a fifth wheel going

(46:30):
along on a date with them. One day, she had
just finished cleaning the emergency room when she walked into
what was known as the drug room, where supplies were kept,
and she saw Pat and Share kissing in there. Elaine
Henninger worked at the switchboard and as a receptionist, and
she said nothing. Whenever Pat and doctor Schaer would go

(46:51):
into Room thirteen, just across from her desk, lock the
door and stay in there for up to an hour.
Here we go again, She'd think. She did resent that
she was left to appease waiting patients. She didn't even
look up when shar and Patty would finally emerge from
the room. Sandra Price, a registered nurse, saw Cher come

(47:11):
up behind pat reach from behind and squeeze her breast,
and she saw pat turn see the doctor and giggle.
Around the same time, another nurse, Betty Williams, was filling
out an order for the clinic, and she walked into
the drug room to find Pat on a stool reaching
for something and doctor Schaer with his hands up her skirt.

(47:32):
Another time, a nurse's aid witnessed almost exactly the same scenario.
So this was a very.

Speaker 1 (47:37):
Scandalous good gossip material.

Speaker 3 (47:40):
Absolutely so. In April of seventy six, Cher began to
put together a plan to get what he wanted. He
called a friend in New Mexico, whom he met when
he was a public Health service officer. Cher knew that
the dry climate made it a good place for an
allergy practice, and Cher wanted to know what he could
expect in New Mexico because it just sounded perfect. It

(48:02):
seemed like a perfect plan. He could leave Montrose and
start over, But of course he did not intend to
go alone. Oh no, I take pat with absolutely. His
plan is to take Pat and the kids, so Marty's
got to get out of the way. But by this time,
for Marty, the humiliation had really reached a peak. Now

(48:23):
even his parents knew what was going on with Pat
and Cher, and they were very troubled by all the
talk in town. Not long after Cher had moved out,
Anne had cornered Marty's sister and told her that Cher
was having an affair with Pat. When the Dylans confronted
their son and daughter in law, Pat ordered them out
of the house. How dare you say that? Get the

(48:46):
hell out of my house. I can just picture it.
Marty later conceded that there were problems in his marriage,
but you know, he felt really embarrassed and bad. He
reassured his parents that things would work out, But his dad, Larry,
was furious at his daughter in law. He found her
behavior to be disgraceful. And these are strict Catholics, by

(49:06):
the way. Then one night, not long before Marty's death,
Joe Dylan, his mom, saw the light on in her
son's house and decided to drop in. When she entered,
she found Pat and Cher sipping wine on the basement
couch while Marty was upstairs sleeping, so Pat was furious,
and Joe was just heartbroken, and she laughed, But can

(49:28):
you imagine he's sleeping and they're drinking wine in his house.
It's just very shitty.

Speaker 1 (49:33):
Yeah, it is.

Speaker 3 (49:34):
It's really not nice.

Speaker 1 (49:35):
It's the only thing worse would be to find him
naked on the couch together.

Speaker 3 (49:39):
Well, maybe her timing just wasn't right. I wouldn't be surprised.

Speaker 1 (49:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (49:43):
So, now, by May of seventy six, Marty felt like
he could no longer hide from the truth. One week
after his thirtieth birthday, he changed his fifty thousand dollars
life insurance policy, making his children his beneficiaries instead of Pat.
The marriage, he decided, was over, but in the last
weeks of his life, Marty must have had a change

(50:03):
of heart, so he gave Pat an ultimatum. It was
him or Cher. When Marty finally gathered the strength to
confront her, Pat said she didn't want a divorce. She
told him she would stay with him and they would
remain a family. So whether she admitted the affair or
continued to deny it to Marty, only the two of
them would know. But she told Cher the affair with

(50:25):
him was over and that she would not be moving
with him to New Mexico. And you can imagine he
was not happy to hear that. No, so she told
Cher she couldn't get a divorce, that she couldn't go
against the tenants of Catholicism. Patty was not prepared to
leave her husband. She couldn't face her family or the
people in town, and a part of her still did

(50:47):
love Marty. But Cher couldn't understand this. He was not
hearing what he wanted to hear. So just a few
weeks before June second, Cher went to visit a friend
who was a devout Catholic and a long time patient
of his. Cher said he wanted to understand Catholicism and
he asked if pat could be practiced, could be a
practicing Catholic if they moved to another state. But he

(51:10):
was told no, her record would follow her and she
couldn't go to confession and receive the sacraments of the church.

Speaker 1 (51:17):
So the record being that she was a divorcee.

Speaker 3 (51:19):
Yes, yes, she couldn't be a divorce She.

Speaker 1 (51:22):
Could go to New Mexico and attend church, she just
couldn't go to confession.

Speaker 3 (51:28):
Well, yeah, but if she's going to do that, she
really would need to end up getting divorced, right, And
of course this was just not the answer that Cher
wanted to hear, and he decided to come up with
a new plan. So that's when the events a gun
smoke happened and Marty Dylan was killed.

Speaker 1 (51:46):
And it was termed an accident, yes, at least at
that point.

Speaker 3 (51:50):
At that point, so that evening after the shooting, it

(52:15):
was about seven pm when two police officers rang the
doorbell at Larry and Joe Dillon's house. When Larry saw
the officers, he really wasn't worried right away because Larry
was the town's mayor and it wasn't unusual to have
the police come to his door. But soon his world
was shattered. He and his wife held each other, praying

(52:36):
that this was a terrible mistake. But their son, the
officer said, was dead. He had died in a shooting
at Gunsmoke.

Speaker 1 (52:44):
So a word of Marty's death traveled quickly in the
small town, but the horror of the news was worse
for those who had long suspected an affair between Shar
and Pat. They believed the doctor might be would be
capable of anything for them. SHARE's account of what happened
was dismissed his fiction. When Pat called Kendall Sean late

(53:06):
that later that evening and told him there had been
an accident at gun Smoke and Marty was dead. Kendall
listened silently, regretting his decision not to shoot skeet with
Marty that day. And it wasn't only friends of Marty's
who were suspicious a trooper at gun Smoke, unaware of
any motive Share might have had to kill Dylan pointed

(53:27):
out numerous inconsistencies with SHARE's story of the victim falling
on his gun.

Speaker 3 (53:33):
Yeah, this was just really we're going to find out
it was physically impossible for it to have happened that way.

Speaker 1 (53:39):
Yeah, it took him a little time to get to that.

Speaker 3 (53:41):
It took a long time. Yes, But the trooper said
to the coroner, this just could not have happened this way,
And he pointed to Marty's untied shoelace. The boot itself
was still tight on his leg. The laces were just
untied and laid that way. If he'd been running, the
top of the boot and the rest of the lacing
would have opened. He also noticed that the unbroken clay

(54:03):
birds under the body's left arm. He also noticed the
unbroken clay birds under the body's left arm by the
wrist and the skeet throwing machine just six feet away
off from the right hand. About three feet from the body,
he saw the set of ear protectors and sunglasses that
were spattered with blood. He could easily make out the

(54:24):
markings on Marty's head where it had been worn, and
it was the only area that was not spattered with blood.
The victim had been wearing the ear protectors and someone
had to take them off. The position of Marty's body
on his back with his arms outstretched, and the large
hole in the center of his chest were not consistent
with a contact wound and not compatible with the story

(54:47):
told by doctor Cher. It was too big of a
wound to be a contact wound. And Marty was also
killed with Sheer's gun, so that was weird. Why would
he be carrying that gun when he owned his own
that was right there? Then? Also, why would Cher smash
that gun against a tree? It was very strange that
Pat did not find her husband's death suspicious. The timing

(55:10):
was strange, and she knew that Marty was very safety
conscious with guns, but if she suspected that Stephen Chaer
was lying, she showed no signs of it, not even
on the evening of Marty's death, and really not even
for the rest of her life. On the same evening,
Marty was killed and Cher overdosed on sleeping pills. A

(55:30):
friend found her and called the ambulance. Cher told the
police that he had talked to some of her friends.
He said that she raises dogs and one died and
she'd gone downhill since. So within six weeks of Marty's death,
Pat Dylan took her children and moved into an apartment,
and it was about a three hour drive from Montrose.

(55:52):
She sold Marty's red BMW, and she told Kendall Schran
that he should keep the race car that he and
Marty had bought to go together. She told him Marty
would have wanted him to have it. Pat would get
nothing from Marty's fifty thousand dollars life insurance policy once
his death was ruled an accident. The money was placed
in trust for his children, Michael and Suzanne until they

(56:15):
were twenty one. So Pat trusted Cher and believed him
when some of her friends questioned his frequent visits to
her place. Pat was defensive and said that she was
alone with two small children, and he was the only
one willing to help her, So that's hard to believe
to be yeah, in private, she really just may have

(56:36):
rationalized that Marty hadn't been there for her, that he
had kind of pushed her aside and didn't appreciate or
love her. She had been lonely in her marriage and
so had share apparently, and her whole idea was that
they came together out of need. So over Thanksgiving weekend,
just five months after Marty's death, Pat went shopping with

(56:56):
Chaer at a department store in Philadelphia. So as they
brought through the lingerie department, Pat held up a cream
colored lace nightgown and Cher was seen nodding his approval
because just a few yards away neighbors who lived in
Montrose and had actually known Pat. Marty and doctor Cher
were horrified. They did not approach Sharon Pat, but they

(57:19):
did share what they'd seen with others around town. So
the rumor mill was back in action.

Speaker 1 (57:24):
I bet it was going full speed, yep. So Sharon
Pat stayed in constant contact after he left Montrose in
early January to move to New Mexico. He moved into
an apartment, opened his office, and within a short time
he had built the growing practice. He and Pat talked
daily on the phone. In the following May, Sheriff suffered

(57:44):
his second heart attack, and Pat flew to his side.
A few weeks later, Cher returned to the East Coast
to see a cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital
and stayed with Pat and the children for about a month.

Speaker 3 (57:58):
Wow, well, then you know something going on at that point.
But I don't think they were even really trying to
hide it.

Speaker 1 (58:04):
No, you know, once Marty died, why you might get
looked at the little sideways. They don't care.

Speaker 3 (58:10):
No, they really didn't seem to care. A few months later,
Cher flew to Philadelphia and took Pat to a bamtzvah
for his cousin's daughter in New Jersey. The following April,
Pat visited New Mexico for a few days, and it
was during this visit that the couple decided to get married.
By now, almost two years had passed since Marty's death,

(58:31):
so I guess it seemed to them they'd waited long
enough so two months later, Stephen Cher and Pat were
married in New Mexico in a ceremony attended by Michael,
who was now aged seven, and Suzanne, aged five. For
the Dylan children, memories of their father had just faded.
Marty's parents found out about the wedding when Joe tried

(58:52):
to reach Pat at her apartment in Pennsylvania, and the
landlord told her that Pat and the children had moved.
So Joe called her daughter and asked her to call
Pat's mother, But when she reached Laura Carvell, Pat's mother,
she was evasive and actually refused to tell her where
Hat had moved to. So that was strange. There shouldn't

(59:12):
have been any bad blood there. She said that the
Dylans would receive a letter in the mail from Pat,
and sure enough, two days later they did. By then,
though Larry and Joe had already heard from others in
town that Pat was in New Mexico and married to
Stephen Cheer. In the letter that Pat sent them, she
was defensive and she said it was really pointless to

(59:34):
talk face to face, but she did say that they
were welcome to visit their grandchildren in New Mexico anytime
for a few.

Speaker 1 (59:42):
Years after his son's death, Larry Dillon went to the
office of Marty's former partner, Bob Dean, practically every week,
urging Dean to help him get the Pennsylvania State Police
to investigate the shooting of Marty. Dean was active in
local politics, so his support could have made a difference.
Obden was convinced that Shecher was incapable of murder. He

(01:00:03):
thought it was a suicide, even though the physical evidence
contradicted that theory.

Speaker 3 (01:00:08):
It contradicted it quite strongly. Detective Jock Collier and Secretary
Bonnie Meade felt just as strongly as Larry did that
Cher had killed Marty. Collier was extremely frustrated by not
being able to convince the DA and the State Police
to examine the case. It really bothered him that it
wasn't within his jurisdiction. The Pennsylvania State Police were clear

(01:00:32):
that the death was accidental. Throughout the summer following Marty's death,
Cher had kept a low profile in town, trying to
steer clear of Collier. The detective continued to call him,
though repeatedly asking him to return for further questioning, but
on advice of his lawyer, he said he would not
speak about that day at gunsmoke. Collier did keep the

(01:00:53):
pressure on because he was disturbed when Cher moved away
to New Mexico, and he called the local and state
police in New Mexico to let them know that the
doctor was suspected of a homicide. Now, for her part,
Anne Cher really was not surprised to hear of her
former husband's marriage to Pat. In the two years since

(01:01:13):
the divorce, her life had changed dramatically. Now she was
planning her own wedding. Her husband to be, John Vitel,
was a wealthy man twenty seven years older than she,
and he was the owner of two Ford dealerships in Montrose.
So Vitel had actually begun to check on Anne after
that suicide attempt that she made. He didn't really know

(01:01:36):
her well, but he was concerned by what he'd heard
around town, and he just wanted Anne to know that
she had a friend now. He too had been going
through difficult times. His wife of many years had died
just the previous February, so he was lonely too. He
was very patient and kind with her, and he made
her laugh, and Anne gradually realized that she was suffering

(01:01:58):
from low self esteem. As she regained confidence in herself,
she realized that, you know, there were actually many people
who did care about her. So Pat and Cher had
bought a house in New Mexico and enrolled Michael and
Suzanne in Catholic school there. They had also joined a church.
A year after Patt and Share married, John and Laura

(01:02:19):
Carveller sold their house in Montrose and they relocated to
New Mexico. Then Pat's brother and his wife moved west.
Pat's parents were pleased to see their daughter remarried to them.
Share was a perfect man for her. Remember her mom
always wanted her to marry a doctor.

Speaker 1 (01:02:36):
That's settle for the lawyer.

Speaker 3 (01:02:37):
Yeah, so in the months before he left Montrose, he
had often visited them at their home, and Laura had
even cooked for him. The Carvellers were convinced that the
talk of an affair between the two was absolutely ridiculous, poppycock,
she called it, Yes, yes, because Patty was just not
that kind of girl. So the Share, they knew, was

(01:02:59):
kind of thoughtful and he treated Patty's children as if
they were his own. And of course, yes he was
a doctor, but you know, he'd wanted to take that
whole family from the beginning. I think he wanted to
be the father to those children.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13):
He sure did.

Speaker 3 (01:03:14):
Then, in the fall of nineteen eighty, the Share family
grew at the hospital. One night, Shaer heard about a
newborn boy whose mother was planning to put him up
for adoption. So Jonathan was just three days old when
the Shares brought him home. By then, Michael was nine
and Suzanne was seven. The Dylan children were just thrilled
with their new brother, and the Shares were living a

(01:03:36):
really good life. He drove a high end steel Gray Mercedes,
and Pat kept busy with the children, sometimes helping out
at her husband's office. They seemed happy, But you know
who wasn't happy, Marty's parents and a lot of people
who cared about Marty.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
I can see where they're doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:03:56):
So Joe and Larry Dlon hired a private investigator to
look into Marty's death, and soon after, the DA spent
three hours with Larry and Joe Dilon, hearing their concerns
about their son's death. When he left, they felt some
hope because the DA had seemed interested in what they
had to say. On the same evening, Marty was killed
and cher overdosed on sleeping pills. A friend found her

(01:04:19):
and called the ambulance. Cher told the police that he
had talked to some of her friends. He said that
she raises dogs and one died and she'd gone downhill since.
So within six weeks of Marty's death, Pat Dylan took
her children and moved into an apartment and it was
about a three hour drive from Montrose. She sold Marty's

(01:04:40):
red BMW and she told Kendall Schran that he should
keep the race car that he and Marty had bought together.
She told him Marty would have wanted him to have it.
Pat would get nothing from Marty's fifty thousand dollars life
insurance policy once his death was ruled an accident. The
money was placed in trust for his children, Michael and
Suzanne until they were twenty one. So Pat trusted Cher

(01:05:03):
and believed him. When some of her friends questioned his
frequent visits to her place, Pat was defensive and said
that she was alone with two small children and he
was the only one willing to help her, So that's
hard to believe to be yeah, in private, she really
just may have rationalized that Marty hadn't been there for her,

(01:05:23):
that he had kind of pushed her aside and didn't
appreciate or love her. She had been lonely in her
marriage and so had Share apparently, and her whole idea
was that they came together out of need. So over
Thanksgiving weekend, just five months after Marty's death, Pat went
shopping with Cher at a department store in Philadelphia. So

(01:05:44):
as they browsed through the lingerie department, Pat held up
a cream colored lace nightgown, and Cher was seen nodding
his approval because just a few yards away, neighbors who
lived in Montrose and had actually known Pat, Marty and
doctor Share were horrified. They did not approach Sharon Pat,
but they did share what they'd seen with others around town.

(01:06:06):
So the rumor mill was back in action.

Speaker 1 (01:06:09):
I bet it was going full speed yep. So Sharon
Pat stayed in constant contact after he left Montrose in
early January to move to New Mexico. He moved into
an apartment, opened his office, and within a short time
he had built the growing practice. He and Pat talked
daily on the phone. In the following May, Sheriff suffered
his second heart attack, and Pat flew to his side.

(01:06:32):
A few weeks later, Cher returned to the East Coast
to see a cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital
and stayed with Pat and the children for about a month.

Speaker 3 (01:06:42):
Wow, well then you know something's going on at that point.
But I don't think they were even really trying to
hide it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:48):
No, you know, once Marty died, while he might get
looked at a little sideways. So yeah, they don't care.

Speaker 3 (01:06:56):
No, they really didn't seem to care. A few months later,
Cher flew to Philadelphia and took Pat to a bamtzvah
for his cousin's daughter in New Jersey. The following April,
Pat visited New Mexico for a few days, and it
was during this visit that the couple decided to get married.
By now, almost two years had passed since Marty's death,

(01:07:18):
so I guess it seemed to them they'd waited long enough.
So two months later, Stephen Cher and Pat were married
in New Mexico in a ceremony attended by Michael, who
was now aged seven, and Suzanne, aged five. For the
Dylan children, memories of their father had just faded. Marty's
parents found out about the wedding when Joe tried to

(01:07:39):
reach Pat at her apartment in Pennsylvania, and the landlord
told her that Pat and the children had moved. So
Joe called her daughter and asked her to call Pat's mother,
But when she reached Laura Carveller, Pat's mother, she was
evasive and actually refused to tell her where Hat had
moved to, so that was strange. Didn't have been any

(01:08:00):
bad blood there. She said that the Dylans would receive
a letter in the mail from Pat, and sure enough,
two days later they did. By then, though Larry and
Joe had already heard from others in town that Pat
was in New Mexico and married to Stephen Cheer. In
the letter that Pat sent them, she was defensive and
she said it was really pointless to talk face to face,

(01:08:22):
but she did say that they were welcome to visit
their grandchildren in New Mexico anytime.

Speaker 1 (01:08:28):
For a few years after his son's death, Larry Dillon
went to the office of Marty's former partner, Bob Dean,
practically every week, urging Dean to help him get the
Pennsylvania State Police to investigate the shooting of Marty. Dean
was active in local politics, so his support could have
made a difference. Bob Dean was convinced that Sheer was
incapable of murder. He thought it was a suicide, even

(01:08:51):
though the physical evidence contradicted that theory.

Speaker 3 (01:08:54):
It contradicted it quite strongly. Detective Jock Collier and Secretary
Bonnie Mead felt just as strongly as Larry did that
Cher had killed Marty. Collier was extremely frustrated by not
being able to convince the DA and the state police
to examine the case. It really bothered him that it
wasn't within his jurisdiction. The Pennsylvania State Police were clear

(01:09:17):
that the death was accidental. Throughout the summer following Marty's death,
Cher had kept a low profile in town, trying to
steer clear of Collier. The detective continued to call him,
though repeatedly asking him to return for further questioning, but
on advice of his lawyer, he said he would not
speak about that day at gunsmoke. Collier did keep the

(01:09:38):
pressure on because he was disturbed when Cher moved away
to New Mexico, and he called the local and state
police in New Mexico to let them know that the
doctor was suspected of a homicide. Now for her part an,
Cher really was not surprised to hear of her former
husband's marriage to Pat. In the two years since the divorce,

(01:09:58):
her life had changed dramatically. Now she was planning her
own wedding. Her husband to be, John Vitel, was a
wealthy man twenty seven years older than she, and he
was the owner of two Ford dealerships in Montrose. So
Vitel had actually begun to check on Anne after that
suicide attempt that she made. He didn't really know her well,

(01:10:19):
but he was concerned by what he'd heard around town,
and he just wanted Anne to know that she had
a friend now. He too had been going through difficult times.
His wife of many years had died just the previous February,
so he was lonely too. He was very patient and
kind with her, and he made her laugh, and Anne
gradually realized that she was suffering from low self esteem.

(01:10:42):
As she regained confidence in herself, she realized that, you know,
there were actually many people who did care about her.
So Pat and Cher had bought a house in New
Mexico and enrolled Michael and Suzanne in Catholic school there.
They had also joined a church a year after Pat
and Share. Mary John and Laura Carveller sold their house

(01:11:02):
in Montrose and they relocated to New Mexico. Then Pat's
brother and his wife moved west. Pat's parents were pleased
to see their daughter remarried. To them Share was a
perfect man for her. Remember her mom always wanted her
to marry a doctor.

Speaker 1 (01:11:17):
That's settled for the lawyer.

Speaker 3 (01:11:19):
Yeah. So in the months before he left Montrose, he
had often visited them at their home, and Laura had
even cooked for him. The Carvellers were convinced that the
talk of an affair between the two was absolutely ridiculous, poppycock,
she called it. Yes, yes, because Patty was just not
that kind of girl. So the Share, they knew, was

(01:11:41):
kind and thoughtful, and he treated Patty's children as if
they were his own. And of course, yes he was
a doctor, but you know, he'd wanted to take that
whole family from the beginning. I think he wanted to
be the father to those children.

Speaker 1 (01:11:55):
He did.

Speaker 3 (01:11:56):
Then, in the fall of nineteen eighty, the Share family
grew At the hospital, one night, Chaer heard about a
newborn boy whose mother was planning to put him up
for adoption. So Jonathan was just three days old when
the Shares brought him home. By then, Michael was nine
and Suzanne was seven. The Dylan children were just thrilled
with their new brother, and the Shares were living a

(01:12:18):
really good life. He drove a high end steel Gray Mercedes,
and Pat kept busy with the children, sometimes helping out
at her husband's office. They seemed happy, but you know
who wasn't happy, Marty's parents and a lot of people
who cared about Marty. So Joe and Larry Dlon hired
a private investigator to look into Marty's death, and soon

(01:12:39):
after the DA spent three hours with Larry and Joe Dylan,
hearing their concerns about their son's death. When he left,
they felt some hope because the DA had seemed interested
in what they had to say. At the end of April,
the DA and three investigators drove to the University of Pennsylvania,
and this was for a presentation to twenty nine medical

(01:13:01):
examiners and forensic pathologists. Among them was doctor Isidore Mehalakas,
a leading forensic pathologist. Mihalakis had consulted with the Montrose
coroner back in nineteen seventy six. When the coroner called
to ask what to look for in an accidental shooting.
By a show of hands, a majority of the specialists

(01:13:24):
agreed that the manner of death had been a homicide.
A smaller number chose suicide or accident. But in a
letter dated May twenty fourth, nineteen eighty nine, the DA
offered little optimism that criminal charges could ever be brought
against Share. He claimed that the medical experts had concluded
that the manner of death was either accidental or self inflicted.

(01:13:46):
The DA's letter devastated the Dylans. By mid July of
that year, their private investigator was doing ballistics testing using
the same make and model gun the PI shot into
pigs to attempt to simulate the same sized wound found
in Marty Dillon's chest. The investigator had to move back

(01:14:06):
three to five feet away to create a hole of
one and one quarter inch. So the PI later shared
his findings with two forensic pathologists, and in the end
they all agreed it was impossible for the shooting to
have been an accident. Of course, this conclusion didn't surprise
Larry Dillon at all. He'd known it all along. Later

(01:14:27):
that summer, he and his son in law went to
see doctor Grace who performed the autopsy on Marty, and
asked him to share any information he had. At one point,
doctor Grace told the two that he thought Marty had
used poor judgment in going shooting alone with Cher. A
few weeks later, the Dylans asked the coroner to come

(01:14:49):
to their house. Joe, who begun to keep a diary
of the investigation, later wrote that the corner acted nervous
throughout this visit, and Larry told him that they were
not satisfy with the investigation into Marty's death. So in
January of nineteen ninety one, year after he'd been hired,
the private eye pulled everything together in a report, so

(01:15:11):
his judgment was firm Marty's death had been a homicide.
He sent a copy of his report to the Pennsylvania
State Police. By now the Dylans had a surprising new supporter,
that coroner that was first there, John Connerton. After he'd
finally read the report, the coroner changed his mind. He
then went to see the DA After much discussion, it

(01:15:34):
was decided that Corporal Richard Kane would approach doctor Shaer
in New Mexico and attempt to have him sign the
statement that he'd given to Detective Collier back in seventy six.
So the corporal flew to New Mexico in April and
went directly to the police. Then two officers went with
him to doctor Chaer's allergy office. When the corporal identified

(01:15:56):
himself to the receptionist in the waiting room, Doctor Share,
upon hearing the news, barricaded himself in the back and
he called his attorney, Peter O'Malley in Pennsylvania. O'Malley told
him to put the corporal on the phone, and the
attorney was just furious. Corporal Kane explained that he had
an unsigned statement that the doctor had given in nineteen

(01:16:18):
seventy six and the state police just wanted his signature
and a chance to ask a few more questions. O'Malley
told him Share wouldn't sign or say anything. He told
the corporal he was on private property and he needed
to leave immediately. So it wasn't until three months later
in May of nineteen ninety one, that the state police

(01:16:39):
finally sent evidence to the FBI lab. When the report
came back, the results were stunning. Cher's boots had high
velocity blood spatter, which revealed that he had been within
a few feet of the victim. The report also stated
that the spatter on the tree stump and on the
instep of Dylan's shoe suggested that he was sitting or

(01:17:01):
squatting near the log, not running. Ballistics experts had reassembled
Sheer's broken shotgun and test fired it, determining the muzzle
was up to three feet away when it was fired.
So at this point, Cher knew nothing about what was
happening back in Montrose. The visit from Corporal Cain had
really rattled him, but Cher was living his life without

(01:17:23):
fear of being arrested up until then.

Speaker 1 (01:17:25):
Yeah, he'd gotten away with it for what sixteen years
or so, so he's probably thinking he's in the clear.

Speaker 4 (01:17:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:17:53):
Over the summer of ninety two, Larry and Joe Dylon
learned from their grandson Michael Dillon that pat and and
Cher had moved to North Carolina, where Share was taking
over another practice. The local newspaper there published a story
about his arrival, and patients began calling to set up appointments.
So once a month for a few days, Share commuted

(01:18:14):
to New Mexico to work in his original office, and
financially the Shares were doing very well.

Speaker 1 (01:18:21):
Yeah, alergiers do pretty well. Yeah, in terms of annual income.

Speaker 3 (01:18:25):
Well, there are a lot of procedures they can do, yeah,
which are money making, right.

Speaker 1 (01:18:29):
Right, all those skin testing and stuff like that.

Speaker 3 (01:18:32):
Yeah. Well, hearing was held when the Dylans requested an
exhumation of Marty's body for a new autopsy. So it
was April twenty ninth, nineteen ninety five, and the steel
vault containing his casket was raised from the ground, loaded
onto a truck, and taken to Lehigh University Medical Center.

(01:18:52):
For the next six hours, doctor Mihilakis searched for answers.
He measured the length of the arms and examined the
type and size of the wound and its characteristics. He
performed microscopic analysis of the skin at the impact area,
looking for powder burns and gunpowder residue and their location
on the body. So by four o'clock that day, the

(01:19:14):
doctor was done and the body was on its way
back to Montrose. So an interesting thing that was mentioned
here is that when they brought him up, his body
was pretty much just as it had looked at the funeral.

Speaker 1 (01:19:26):
Good job from the bomber.

Speaker 3 (01:19:29):
I guess I just think it's kind of creepy. I
have no desire for an open casket. I just don't
like that. It's just kind of gross. I don't know,
I don't like that. But they have like this new
what do they call it, organic or natural burial something
like that. Yeah, where they just bury you, not embalmed
and all that wrapped in like a cloth or something,

(01:19:52):
so you're not taking up the earth forever. So I
would prefer that, just so you know, I'm okay. So
in May, doctor Mihailakis submitted his report to the state
police and coroner. He determined that Marty could not have
accidentally pulled the trigger. If he had fallen over that

(01:20:12):
sixteen gage shotgun, he would have hit the ground before
the gun. There were no grass or dirt stains on
his clothing or hands, suggesting he had fallen. It was
also not possible that Marty had snagged the weapon trigger
on a branch. Tests showed no gunpowder residue on the body,
and the spread of pellet wounds suggested that the shot

(01:20:34):
was fired from three to five feet away. The doctor
also concluded that investigators were unable to recreate dropping the
weapon so that it would discharge upon hitting the ground.
The weight of the weapon would have caused the barrel
to have pointed down if it had been dropped, so
in the end, they found that evidence suggested Marty was

(01:20:54):
crouched with his shirt billowing away from his chest when
he was shot, and that the shot had destroyed his heart.
There were no burn marks on his clothing or skin,
no marks a gun muzzle would have caused the victim
to fall on his weapon, and no blood on the
gun barrel. When Cher learned about the coroner's report, he
wasn't thrilled. He learned in a phone call from his attorney,

(01:21:18):
Peter O'Malley. O'Malley told him to get out of North
Carolina and surrender himself in Pennsylvania.

Speaker 1 (01:21:24):
I'm sure that's exactly what Cher wanted to hear right now.

Speaker 3 (01:21:29):
He was really scared, so scheron his attorney, gave a
press conference, but the police were not ready to arrest him.
He went back to North Carolina, where he was eventually arrested,
and following the arrest, Cher was taken to the local
court where arrest papers were processed, and then he was
escorted to the Lincoln County Jail. Amazing, he did fight

(01:21:52):
extradition to Pennsylvania. The last thing he wanted was to
tell his account of what happened at gun Smoke to
a jury, but he was extradited and taken for a
ten hour drive back to Montrose. The trip ended at
the State Police barracks, where Shre was fingerprinted and photographed.
He was then transported to the District Justices courtroom, which

(01:22:13):
was not far from Montrose, in leg irons and handcuffs,
holding a copy of the New American Bible. Cher was
arraigned on charges that he had murdered Marty Dillon on
June second, nineteen seventy six, and within days of her
husband's arrest, Pat called friends and family and asked that
they come to Montrose so they could testify at a

(01:22:35):
bail hearing about Sher's character and his good reputation. So,
one by one everyone she called agreed immediately, but bail
was set for one million dollars and he was not
happy with that. He was eventually able to get the
amount reduced, though, and he did walk free on bail.

Speaker 1 (01:22:53):
Shar's trial was scheduled for September nineteen ninety seven. The
trial was expected to last four to six weeks. Just
days before jury selection, Sharon his attorneys sat down to
review their defense. The defense would concede that there had
been a sexual relationship between Sharon pat Dillon. The prosecution's witnesses,

(01:23:15):
who had lived nearby or worked in Montrosse General Hospital,
would convince the jury anyway. If he could convince the
jury that what they would hear from the defense was
the truth, he'd believed they had their best chance. Share
must have realized that his account of what happened on
June second, nineteen seventy six was just not credible. In
the days before the trial, he admitted that he'd lied

(01:23:37):
about what happened at Gunsmoke, So the story changed again.

Speaker 3 (01:23:41):
Sure did so. Opening arguments began on the morning of
September twenty second, and the Commonwealth went first. The prosecutor,
Robert Kempo Longo, told the jurors that he would present
them with a table of contents, an easy reference guide
to the witnesses that they would hear. He explained that
this would help them put together the pieces of the

(01:24:03):
puzzle in this homicide. So he talked about Scher and
his affair with Pat Dylan. Then he recounted a bit
about Marty Dylan, a simple man, he called him, who
loved his children and his wife, who always thought the
best of people, a man who didn't want to believe
that there were people who had evil in their hearts,
even though on the outside they were full of smiles.

(01:24:26):
He told the jury that Cher and Patty started having
an affair, a sexual affair, but the sexual affair was
not a discreet one. He told the jury that Patty
had told Cher just weeks before her husband's death that
she could not leave town with him, that she was
staying with Marty. Marty, he told the jurors, had issued

(01:24:46):
an ultimatum to his wife and she had said that
she would choose him, but Cher couldn't accept this because
this was someone telling him that he could not have
what he wanted. Then Campalongo took the jury through the
events of June second. He talked about how Marty was
uncomfortable about going shooting alone with Cher, how he had

(01:25:07):
invited numerous friends, practically begging them to join him, but
when they didn't, Marty win anyway, not believing that any
harm could come to him from Stephen Cher. Then he
went through the shooting and all of the forensic results,
which were very convincing, so when it was time for
the defense to give their statement, to the surprise of

(01:25:28):
many in the courtroom, the defense attorney told the jury
that Cher and Patty Dillon were having an affair during
the last year of her marriage. He told them they
would hear that from Cher himself. Then he went on
to discuss the experts who the defense would present, and
they had actually gotten some big names. They got doctor
Cyril Weck and doctor Michael Baden and doctor John Sheene.

(01:25:51):
He told them they would learn that the Winchester is
dangerously designed. Their expert examined the gun that caused Marty's
death and found it was filled with dirt and grime,
which would increase the possibility of an accident. He recounted
what went on after Marty's death and how coroner Connerton
had ruled it an accident. But in the days that followed,

(01:26:14):
one by one, nurses, former neighbors, and friends stepped up
to the witness box for the prosecution and shared what
they knew about the love affair between doctor Cher and
Patty Dylan. Then the week after that, expert witnesses took
the stand. The statement Chaer gave to the state police
was read into evidence. The clothing, the Winchester, and the

(01:26:37):
spent magnum load were shown to the jury. When large
photos of the body of Marty Dillon were displayed, his
daughter Suzanne hung her head. Doctor Mihilakis spent more than
a day on the witness stand and endured intense cross examination.
The attorneys struggled to cast doubt on the doctor's contention
that the gunshot had been from at least three feet

(01:26:59):
away and there were no powder burns to suggest a
contact womb, but he was very firm in his conclusions.
So it was in early October when the prosecution rested,
and then it was the defense's turn, and their first
witness was doctor Stephen Cheer himself. Under direct examination, his

(01:27:20):
voice was calm, and he began recounting his early years
growing up in Toronto and Florida, the death of his parents,
his medical training, and his marriage. He told the jury
that he and Anne had just grown apart, he'd been
working too much, and he admitted having an affair with
Pat but insisted they weren't really in love at the time.

(01:27:40):
It was only a sexual relationship. Now, why would that
sound better? Yeah, kind of sounds worse. So He told
the jury he wasn't interested in getting involved with anyone,
but he was just emerging from a bad marriage. Then
Cher began to talk about June second, nineteen seventy six.
He said it had been Marty who'd arranged the skeet

(01:28:03):
shooting outing, and that after the various friends dropped out.
Cher said he hadn't even really wanted to go at all.
It was cold and overcasts that day, but he explained
that Marty had shown up at his house in the
BMW and had already bought Hamburger meat for a barbecue
and didn't want to waste it, and so Shaer told

(01:28:23):
the jury he went.

Speaker 5 (01:28:25):
So.

Speaker 3 (01:28:25):
Cher described the drive to gun Smoke and how they
shot the clay pigeons for a while. Then he told
the jury a story that no one had heard before.
He claimed that Marty Dillon's mood had changed abruptly, and
without warning, Marty confronted him about the affair. Then Cher
said he had admitted to it. He said that Marty
wanted to know how the affair had started. He told

(01:28:48):
Marty that he and Pat worked closely together and it
just happened. Then he put his hands over his ears.
Cher said The last thing he said to Marty was
you know this is as much your fault as it
is anybody's. Then he heard a yell he had the gun,
and Cher grabbed the gun, trying to take it away
from Marty. They struggled, The gun went off and Marty

(01:29:10):
turned white. Cher turned him over, punched his chest, took
off his glasses and earmuffs. He pinched his nose. Then
he started screaming, Marty, don't die. Stop Marty, don't. But
he knew he was dead. Cher said he panicked. He
didn't know what to do. He said he knew he
couldn't face the public telling them the truth, so he

(01:29:31):
had to make something up another accident, So he made
up a story about him running with the gun and
tripping and falling. He was afraid he would be convicted
and would never be able to practice medicine again, so
he made up that story and took the gun, wiped
off the barrel with a handkerchief. Then he put the
gun with the muzzle facing his head, and untied one

(01:29:53):
of Marty's shoelaces. So when he was finished testifying, Cher
looked relieved, and so did his attorney. Share had actually
done better than expected. He'd been calm throughout his testimony,
looking directly at the jurors and making eye contact. But
the cross examination would be so brutal, and he didn't

(01:30:14):
do so well with that, did he.

Speaker 1 (01:30:17):
No, he didn't, But you'd say, first off, why didn't
he say this story first.

Speaker 3 (01:30:22):
It's even more pleasant because he didn't think it would
be believed.

Speaker 1 (01:30:26):
No, I believe that more than I believe the guy
tripped and the.

Speaker 3 (01:30:31):
Gun went off right right.

Speaker 1 (01:30:33):
Anyway, the state did offer a plea bargain that would
get shared out of prison within seven years. The share
with his wife and step children's sport rejected the offer.
They believe the jury would have quit him. In the
days following the plea effert however, the defense attorney called
a woman who stunned the courtroom with her testimony.

Speaker 3 (01:30:53):
Yeah. So this was Cindy Klein, and she had been
the Dylan's fifteen year old babysitter at the time of
Marty's death. So she testified that a week before Marty's death,
Marty had driven her home after she'd taken care of
Michael and Suzanne for the evening. She claimed he was
drunk and very talkative. She told the jury that Marty

(01:31:14):
confessed to her that Cher had been having an affair
with his wife and that Marty planned to kill him.
She said that Marty told her he would take share
to gun smoke, shoot him, and make it look like
an accident. She alleged that Marty told her he would
be believed because his father was the mayor and Cherr
was the only Jew in town. Yikes. So when Cindy

(01:31:37):
Kline finished testifying, the prosecution barely bothered to cross examine her,
giving the jury the message that she really wasn't incredible
or significant.

Speaker 1 (01:31:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:31:50):
Then, after the defense rested, the prosecution called several rebuttal witnesses,
and this included Julie Ann Poff, Cindy Kleine's sister. Poff
had called Larry and Joe Dillon at home the day
after she learned her sister had claimed that Marty Dillon
told her he'd planned to kill Cher, and the young

(01:32:12):
woman was crying. On the stand, Poff said that Cindy
Kleine shouldn't be believed. She said, she's not telling the truth.
My sister has a hard time telling reality from the truth.
So the prosecutor asked her, how would you describe your
sister's reputation for truthfulness, and Poff answered bad so. The

(01:32:34):
very next day, the prosecution rested its case. The morning
after closing arguments, the judge handed the case to the jury,
and by ten thirty they started deliberations. Larry and Joe
Dillon went home to wait. Then at three o'clock, the
Dylans learned that a note had been passed to the judge.
The jury had a question. The jury's request was simple,

(01:32:57):
but it was kind of revealing. They wanted an other
explanation of the different counts first and third degree murder,
involuntary manslaughter, and homicide by misadventure. This was not a
good sign for the defense, because why would they even
be considering that if they were going to acquit right exactly? So,

(01:33:17):
by five PM, the jury came back with a verdict
of guilty and they had chosen first degree murder. The
prosecutor asked the judge to immediately impose a life's sentence
on the defendant. The defense attorneys stressed that despite the
jury's verdict, the family of Stephen Cher stood behind him.
Moments later, the judge imposed the sentence of life in prison,

(01:33:39):
and the proceedings were over. One interesting note that pat
Cher aka Pat Dillon pleaded guilty to lying under oath
about the adulterous affair that she and the second husband
had during her first marriage. She would serve no jail
time for this misdemeanor charge of false swearing. She was

(01:34:00):
sentenced to fifteen months probation, charged a five hundred dollars fine,
and fifty hours of community service. So basically a slap
on the wrist. But for me, I have to wonder
what did she know?

Speaker 1 (01:34:14):
Yeah, you know, they were quite a close.

Speaker 3 (01:34:16):
Couple, they were both before and after Marty's death. Yes,
so I find it hard to believe that she knew nothing.
Maybe he had told her something like the second story,
But I really feel like she had to have some idea.

Speaker 1 (01:34:30):
Well yeah, just the fact that her husband was aware
of the affair, had issued the ultimatum to her. She
must have had some inkling that maybe something would happen
at gun smoke.

Speaker 3 (01:34:40):
Really beforehand, you think she had an idea?

Speaker 1 (01:34:43):
Yeah, I mean I don't think she knew exactly a date,
but I think she was aware that share might do.

Speaker 3 (01:34:48):
Something and was okay with it because she didn't do
anything to stop it. So that's I'm not sure it
would be interesting if you knew her, because I think
you'd have an idea.

Speaker 1 (01:34:59):
Probably.

Speaker 3 (01:35:00):
She's presented as this Catholic woman with all these morals
and standards, but when you think about her affair with
Share and the way she behaved, she really didn't try
to hide it. She was kind of cruel to her
husband if you think about it. Yes, the way she
did it was really kind of rotten. So I wouldn't
be surprised if she was in on it completely, to

(01:35:21):
be honest.

Speaker 1 (01:35:22):
With you, Yeah, it could be.

Speaker 3 (01:35:24):
It could be.

Speaker 1 (01:35:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:35:25):
But of course the children they didn't remember their father,
so they were on SHARE's side. And the fifty thousand
dollars life insurance, they actually invested that in Shar's defense,
which would have been the last thing Marty wanted to
happen with that money, right for sure. And there were
other inklings that Share was kind of a rotten person.

(01:35:47):
One thing that his ex wife Anne did bring up
was that they had one of their dogs that wasn't
really doing well with the training, and she'd been away
for a day and she came home and she said,
where's Shadow I think his name was, And Cher said, Oh,
I shot him, So just shot a dog like that? Which, Yes,

(01:36:08):
that's evil.

Speaker 1 (01:36:09):
It's very evil.

Speaker 3 (01:36:10):
It's very evil. Yeah. Not a good man for sure.
So it has to make you wonder if Patty was
a good person either to be with him.

Speaker 1 (01:36:18):
That's my thinking.

Speaker 3 (01:36:19):
Yeah, me too.

Speaker 1 (01:36:27):
It's time for listener feedback.

Speaker 3 (01:36:43):
What if we get for feedback?

Speaker 1 (01:36:44):
Got a few voicemails and one email. We got a
voicemail from Tony. She has a case that she wants
to be presented.

Speaker 3 (01:36:53):
Okay, let's hear it.

Speaker 2 (01:36:55):
Huh, Dick and Jill.

Speaker 6 (01:36:57):
It's Tiny from Australia calling. There's a case that I
wondered if you'd be interested in covering. It's a pretty
horrific case. It's about Minna and Una Joe, originating in
New Zealand and covering Carea and a little bit of Australia. Unfortunately,

(01:37:17):
these children were murdered and they were packed into suitcases
by their Korean mother who lived in New Zealand and
put into a storage locker and left there for some time.
And they only found out when she didn't pay the
rent on the storage locker. And it's just come to

(01:37:39):
light that she had left them there for several years
their mother, who are probably saying this wrong hack.

Speaker 3 (01:37:47):
Young Lee was married to.

Speaker 6 (01:37:49):
Ian Joe, and Ian Joe became very ill, and she
was very dependent on him, and she became apparently very
Her friends thought very week and she was by his
side and so forth and was saying some very strange
things she after he did eventually die, and she said

(01:38:12):
she was taking the children on a very long trip
which went through two Hilton hotels in New Zealand and
Hilton in Surface Paradise. But in actual fact she had
killed the children in New Zealand with sleeping tablets or
something like that and put them in the storage locker.

(01:38:34):
She then went to Korea for many years and said
she didn't even have children and began dating and so forth,
and was eventually found out. And it's all back in
the news now. She has been found guilty, but she's
yet to be sentenced. But it's a really terrible, terrible story.

(01:38:56):
They believe that she's not insane, but it one heck
of a story, and I think you guys do an
absolutely great job of covering it. I think it would
just be a big, big deep dive to get into
this story anyhow, enjoying the podcast as usual, and this
will be pretty harrowing. Thanks very much for your podcasts.

Speaker 3 (01:39:20):
A bye from Australia. Thank you, Tony So. We always
love a harrowing case, right yeah, yeah, and this is
it sounds really disturbing and sounds like an evil person,
right oh absolutely, yeah crazy. So yeah, I would love
to do a deep dive. It is horrific, especially because
it's children, but I think it would be worth looking

(01:39:42):
into and could make for some really interesting discussions. So
thank you. We will definitely take a look at that,
Tony bet So. Next, we have a voicemail from Louise.

Speaker 7 (01:39:55):
Hi, guys, it's Louise James. I'm the crazy woman who
recommended the Aaron Patterson case. I didn't mean to leave
you to voicemails. I thought the first one, I looked
at my phone and it was doing nothing, and I
thought that I maybe hadn't hit record or something.

Speaker 3 (01:40:13):
I don't know.

Speaker 8 (01:40:14):
Me and technology we're not exactly on friendly terms. But
I just wanted to say thank you for actually doing
that yet to listen to it. But I just saw
that you have included it, and so I'm looking forward
to that one. It's really nice when you make contact
like this to know that there's somebody on the other end,

(01:40:35):
so it's great. And also I just listened to the
Elma Crawford episode. My god, I've never heard of that,
so that's a good find and it was very interesting.
So thank you for that one too, and thank you
for everything you do.

Speaker 3 (01:40:51):
Okay, bye, Well, thanks Luise. Actually, Aaron Patterson, that's one
of my favorite ones we've done in a while, and
we did get a lot of feedback on that, so
that was fascinating. Also, it was more recent than usually
we're digging years ago to find original cases, but this
one was quite recent. Australia had a podcast like several

(01:41:12):
episodes about her trial, so there was just a ton
of information to access, which made it pretty easy for us.
So I appreciate your input there.

Speaker 1 (01:41:22):
And we've got another voicemail from Giovanna.

Speaker 2 (01:41:25):
Hi, digging jail. How are you. I'm so glad that
those summer's over and now my favorite time of the
year is fall and winter, and you guys coming from
New England know how much I love the Leaves Tourney.

Speaker 3 (01:41:38):
I just wanted to call you. It's Tivanna.

Speaker 2 (01:41:41):
Thank you for saying my name right, And I am
so happy that Donald Edison was convicted of murder of
her conspiring to murder her son in law. Oh it's
just like, oh my god. I was so impressed with
the Mark Half family's impact statement, especially the father, how

(01:42:04):
Donna's scheming ruined so many lives, including her grandchildren. Well,
I'm hoping now that Dan can rest in peace sort of.
I would like to see Wendy in prison as well,
but you know, I guess you have to take what
you can get. But we'll see. But I really do

(01:42:25):
think Dan now can sort of rest in peace. And
my heart goes out to his two beloved boys. They
did deserve to grow up with their father, as well
as the other children who she roped into this. They
can deserve to grow up with their parents and as well.
Just show shows to show you the harm that we

(01:42:46):
do to each other. Well, thanks a lot. Again, just
wanted to give you the update, which I'm sure you
already know about. But love still listening to love listening
to the podcast, and keep it going.

Speaker 3 (01:42:57):
We'll see what happens at this point in my life
if I'm obsessed with the Adelson case. I was thrilled
also to see Donna be convicted. I think there was
no way she was not going to be the amount
of evidence they had. It's just I guess it really
helped that she tried to take off for Vietnam and
that helped them. But otherwise, I just think they had
plenty of evidence to do it sooner, and I am

(01:43:20):
waiting for Wendy to be arrested. So if you're not
familiar with the Adelson case, it was back on July eighteenth,
twenty fourteen, when Florida State law professor Dan Markel was
shot and killed in his Tallahassee garage in a murder
for higher plot that was linked to a bitter custody
dispute with his ex wife, Wendy. So over the next

(01:43:42):
ten years or so up till now, investigators uncovered a
conspiracy that involved Wendy's brother, Charlie Adelson, their mother, Donna Adelson,
and then three others, two hit men, and Charlie's girlfriend,
Catherine meg Biowa. So one of the hit men pled guilty,
the other was convicted. Katie was convicted.

Speaker 9 (01:44:03):
In twenty twenty two, and then Charlie was convicted in
twenty twenty three. And now the mother Donna was convicted
in twenty twenty five, but the motive was to allow
Wendy to relocate with her children to South Florida, which
Dan Markel did not want and had actually legally blocked.
So now we're waiting to see if Wendy's going to

(01:44:24):
be arrested because she has been named an unindicted co conspirator,
and I think there is enough evidence for her to
be charged. So that's what we're waiting to see, is
will Wendy be arrested and tried for Dan's murder. I've
watched so many interviews and analysis of what Wendy did,

(01:44:45):
and especially that drive that she took down by Truscott
Drive where she claimed to drive past.

Speaker 3 (01:44:52):
Then she claimed to turn a little, but then I
don't know if you've seen on YouTube, there are like
three or four people that took the draw and actually
show that from that corner she was talking about to
where the house was is like zero point nine miles,
So there's no way that she just kind of turned
a little and saw the tape and left. Also, it

(01:45:14):
wasn't just the tape. There were several police cars, the
house was roped off, sirens well at least lights were going.
So yes, that is one person I'd like to see
arrested and a trial I will definitely watch. So thanks
a lot for your contributions. We appreciate it. And let's
go to the next one, which is a voicemail from Dallas.

Speaker 1 (01:45:33):
Yes, you recall, and you were wondering what happens to
older inmates in prison and Dallas has the answer for
an answer.

Speaker 3 (01:45:42):
Excellent.

Speaker 10 (01:45:43):
Hi, this is Dallas. In one of the recent episodes,
the Final Arrangement, I know Jill had mentioned wondering what
happens when people get super elderly and they're in prison.
My husband works as a detention deputy in the County Jail.

Speaker 1 (01:46:05):
So you know.

Speaker 5 (01:46:07):
And below I am a husband of Avid Listener. I
am a detention deputy for the County Jail in Central
Florida where we live. I am specifically right now at
least in charge of the Elderly and Infirm wing of
our jail. In there, we do house inmates currently older
than sixty five years old, inmates that require medical equipment disability,

(01:46:31):
and it's also orientation for any inmates who are arrested
under substance charges. It's a direct supervision pod. I am
right there in the middle of all of them. This
enables me to have quick access to any inmate during
any medical emergency. Also, running differently from any other wing

(01:46:52):
in the jail, I have constant communications throughout the day
with medical and additional visits from medical, as well as
priority on sick calls and any issues that arise. I
often have to call medical emergencies and send inmates out
to the hospital via EMS, which is only possible because
I'm right there in the middle of all of them.

(01:47:15):
All the medical equipment, with rare exception, is owned by
the jail, but walkers, canes, crutches, wheelchairs. They're assigned to
inmates who do require them after initial medical screening, and
they do keep them all on the housing unit. They're
not allowed on any other housing unit as long as
they have medical equipment requirements. We also have inmates who

(01:47:37):
are disabled paralyzed. They have full care while they're here,
and if there is any worsening conditions, they're sent out
to the hospital to receive the additional care they need.
Nurses come and change them over, clean them, take care
of their needs in addition to the regular medications and screenings.
So yes, there is a different standard for old and

(01:48:01):
infirm inmates. They're not just out in general population with
anyone else unless they've been medically cleared to do so,
and they do receive additional care and treatment while they
are there. They're still on the hook for their charges,
but they are separate from the rest of the facility.

Speaker 10 (01:48:18):
Anyway, I hope that tells you what you wanted to know.

Speaker 3 (01:48:22):
Thank you so much. The dogs are getting restless, so yeah,
that's that's our home. That's what it's usually like around here.
But thank you so much for that input. I really
appreciate it because of course I thought there had to
be a place, right because some people are in prison
and are not well or are disabled and have various disabilities.
So what a job people do to take care of

(01:48:44):
these people. I'm impressed and I really appreciate the information.
Any comments on that, Dicky, No, you said it all? Okay, Well,
the dogs said more than I did at that point,
got quite noisy.

Speaker 1 (01:48:57):
They just wanted to go out.

Speaker 3 (01:48:58):
Well, it gives everyone an I'd look to how we
normally live. The quiet here at the quiet End is
actually quite rare in our household.

Speaker 1 (01:49:07):
Fleeting.

Speaker 3 (01:49:08):
Yes, okay, So one more piece of feedback is an
email email from Sloan Okay So Sloane writes, Hi, Jill
and Dick, I love listening to your podcast. I was
a little late to the party at the Quiet End,
just started listening this June, but I found myself cruising
through the episodes fairly quickly. I appreciate the research in

(01:49:28):
details you put into the podcast, as I know it
must be very time consuming. I wanted to reach out
to you to tell you about a case here in Colorado.
On Mother's Day in twenty twenty, Suzanne Morphew of Celita, Colorado,
went missing. At first, law enforcement believed that she had
been abducted when they found her mountain bike and helmet,

(01:49:48):
but they quickly determined that the scene was staged. Suzanne's husband,
Barry Morphew, was charged with first degree murder before Suzanne's
body was recovered. Barry was released on April nineteenth, twenty
twenty two, when his charges were dismissed without prejudice, which
means they can bring it back again. In June of

(01:50:09):
this year, he was once again charged with the murder
of his wife and was recently released on bond after
some of his supporters raised the money for him. Crazy,
I know. Anyway, if this piques your interests, I think
it would be a great case for you to cover.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and for
creating such an awesome podcast. Much love from Colorado. Well,

(01:50:32):
thank you, Sloan. I'm aware of this case, but I
really haven't gotten deep into it. I have been thinking
we'd like to go and be at a trial and
report from a trial for something fun to do, but
I think in Colorado they don't televise them, at least
they didn't with the James Craig trial which was in Colorado. Anyway,

(01:50:52):
definitely we'll keep an eye on it because it's something
that we probably will cover at some point. Just really
shocked with the getting out un bail though, because from
what I do know about it, he does seem guilty.

Speaker 1 (01:51:04):
Well, I know we've been sort of hovering around this case. Yeah,
piqued your interest, so I expect once we get through
the trial that we'll be doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:51:13):
Thank you, Sloan. That's a great recommendation. Thank you all
for your input. We really appreciate your feedback. Keep it coming.
We'd love to hear more of your recommendations and your comments.
It's a lot of fun for us to hear your
voicemails and read your emails. So until next time, we'll
see you at the quiet ed Bye bye hie, guys.

Speaker 1 (01:52:01):
Put is and.

Speaker 4 (01:52:04):
Del me to you to be at

Speaker 2 (01:52:11):
A

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