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Another suspect can’t be raised in double homicide trial

RAYMAND VANNIEUWENHOVEN

MARINETTE, Wis. — Attorneys for an 84-year-old man accused of murdering a Green Bay couple more than four decades ago cannot introduce evidence at trial that suggests someone else committed the crimes.

Marinette County Circuit Judge James Morrison issued an eight-page ruling Friday denying use of the Denny rule that would have allowed Raymand Vannieuwenhoven, of Lakewood, Wis., to suggest another man killed 25-year-old David Schuldes and 24-year-old Ellen Matheys on July 9, 1976 in the Town of Silver Cliff.

Specific to Wisconsin, the Denny rule is allowed if the defense can produce evidence that supports motive, opportunity and can place the suspect in proximity to the crime.

Morrison heard oral arguments Thursday from defense attorneys Travis Crowell and Lee Schuchart as well as Marinette County District Attorney DeShea Morrow and Special Prosecutor Mark Williams.

Crowell maintained the man had a history of sexually assaulting others and had been questioned in the double homicide but never charged. According to Crowell, the man “wanted to commit the perfect crime” and had the opportunity to kill the couple.

The man, who died in 2000, reportedly lived about 25 miles away from the McClintock Park campground where the couple was killed.

Crowell disputed the timeline prosecutors constructed from the accounts of a witness who saw the couple alive at 2:15 p.m., the park caretaker who found Schuldes’ body at 2:30 p.m. and records that showed a 2:53 p.m. 911 phone call and a 3:01 p.m. ambulance dispatch.

Crowell said an off-duty Marinette Police Department officer who had been flagged down by the park caretaker after he discovered Schuldes’ body described the corpse as “blue.” Additionally, Crowell said the autopsy report by Dr. Robert Huntington of the University of Wisconsin Hospital in Madison, Wis., mentioned the presence of maggots.

Crowell said the man, who reportedly appeared at the campground hours after Schuldes was found and brought coffee and sandwiches to law enforcement, commented on the “sweet smell” of a woman’s corpse before Matheys’ body was found.

“He was very prophetic, apparently,” Crowell said. “The operating theory at the time was (Matheys) was kidnapped, they had to find her, and at that point (the man) is the only one saying she’s dead and he can smell her.”

Matheys was later found in a nearby wooded area, where she had been sexually assaulted and shot in the chest and abdomen.

But Morrow termed the defense’s argument “a lot of speculation.”

While Morrow acknowledged the other man was a “despicable human being,” the timeline did not allow for him to have committed the murders, as the drive time from the man’s home to the campground was about 40 minutes.

Morrow said the Marinette officer’s recorded statement did not indicate Schuldes’ body appeared blue. Though DNA was found at the scene, “absolutely no DNA evidence” linking the man to Matheys, Morrow said.

DNA found was “a two-person mixture — the victim and the contributor, Mr. Vannieuwenhoven,” Morrow said.

Morrow also said the man made similar comments about the scent of a woman’s corpse on other occasions.

In his ruling, Morrison acknowledged the potential Denny suspect may have had a general motive arising from his “negative personality.” But while it could be argued the man’s history of misconduct was “not so far removed” from what happened to Schuldes and Matheys, there was no evidence the man exploited those outside his home and social circles.

Morrison also wrote if the state’s timeline was correct, the man’s opportunity to kill the couple was “extremely thin.”

That the man appeared to know Matheys was dead before her death was publicly known, even to law enforcement, came down to a “coin flip,” Morrison stated. “He had half a chance to be right or wrong and he happened to be right,” Morrison wrote.

Remote possibility, speculation and a theory without a direct connection were not enough to support Denny evidence, according to the ruling.

Vannieuwenhoven is charged with two counts of first-degree murder, a felony punishable by up to life in prison, in the deaths of Schuldes and Matheys.

Vannieuwenhoven was also charged with first-degree sexual assault, but the charge was dismissed in May 2019 because the statute of limitations had passed. There are no such limitations for homicide.

According to the criminal complaint, Schuldes was fatally shot through the neck with a .30-caliber firearm as he waited for Matheys outside a bathroom. The shooter then either ordered or chased Matheys into a nearby wooded area, where she was sexually assaulted and, after being allowed to put some of her clothing back on, shot in the chest and abdomen.

Though the case went cold, Marinette County detectives continues to have DNA from semen left in Matheys’ shorts periodically analyzed to see if a possible match might surface, according to the criminal complaint.

In 2018, investigators submitted evidence to Virginia-based Parabon Nanolabs, which traced the DNA to a specific couple with ties to the Green Bay, Wis., area, the complaint stated.

Further investigation led to Vannieuwenhoven. A DNA sample obtained from Vannieuwenhoven in March 2019 proved to be a match, investigators claim.

The 84-year-old remains jailed at the Marinette County Law Enforcement Center on a $1 million bond.

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