Alina Fitzpatrick, aged 17, went missing on November 4th, 2011. Her body was found five days later in a remote area of Oklahoma City that is more rural than urban in makeup. She was nude and had suffered blunt force trauma. In addition, she had a number of abrasions and bruises, and she had been gagged, presumably to muffle her screams. If she was sexually assaulted the Oklahoma City police kept it to themselves.
Ms Fitzpatrick was last seen by people other than her killer, or killers a block north of NW 23rd Street and Western Ave, about a mile and a half west of the state capitol building. If one was to travel another six miles west on 23rd you would find yourself within a couple of hundred yards of where most of what was Carinna Saunders' body had been found less than a month earlier.
You would also find yourself in the suburb of Bethany, protected and served at the time by a police force which numbered a little over 30 officers. They were in charge of the Saunders' investigation and within days after taking on the job had decided to conduct the entire affair in the media.
Saunders had been missing for over two weeks when her dismembered body was found in a field behind a grocery store. Fueled by the Bethany cops, ghastly details of her body's condition and her lurid lifestyle were in the paper and on TV seemingly every day. So were the names of suspects, rumors of a snuff video as well as the identities of possible witnesses and informants.
Meanwhile, after a moment of speculation about a connection between the two murders--dismissed immediately by both OKC police and Bethany investigators--the search for what happened to Alina Fitzpatrick was handled without the glare of the media. Because it was and the garish sensationalism surrounding Saunders' death, the public seemed ambivalent about a crime, which, under normal circumstances, would have shocked the entire metro area.
The state medical examiner, Chai S. Choi released Alina Fitzpatrick's autopsy which found 0.96 micrograms of meth per milliliter of blood in her heart. According to the report it's an amount that might have been fatal. As for everything else, you know, being found naked in a field, gagged with head trauma and other signs of physical abuse, she said, "There are apparently suspicious circumstances surrounding the death." And that's how she ruled it, a suspicious death, not a homicide.
Choi didn't have the same problem with Saunders, although she wasn't all that specific. Carina Saunders autopsy said the cause of death was, "violent," and the manner of death, a homicide. Well, when you find someone with their head chopped off homicide does seem pretty obvious, as opposed to suspicious.
The Bethany cops screwed the pooch so badly Oklahoma County D.A. David Prater demanded the OSBI step in to take over the investigation of Carina Saunders' death. It is still ongoing and in the minds of many. In September this year the local CBS affiliate ran an hour and a half special which revealed precious little new information to the public but proved the media just can't let go of a good horror story chock full of gore.
There has been no such interest shown by the public, media, or authorities concerning the killing of Alina Fitzpatrick. She is remembered only by her family, friends, and killer, or killers. A Channel 9 special investigation into her death seems beyond unlikely.
Yes, the true tragedy here, beyond the killings themselves, is the cops investigating Carina Saunders' death were incompetent boobs who desperately wanted to become famous, while the ones who handled Alina Fitzpatrick's case acted professional, but just didn't give a shit.'
sic vita est
The stuff of nightmares, and TV ratings.
ReplyDelete