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It was Jan. 6, 1982, a bitter chilly night with blizzard-like situations, when two ladies hitchhikers vanished from the favored ski resort city of Breckenridge, Colorado, and have been later discovered shot to demise.
Though the ladies — 29-year-old Bobbie Jo Oberholtzer and 21-year-old Annette Schnee — disappeared on the identical day, their instances weren’t linked till Annette’s physique was found six months later. She was sporting an orange sock — a current Christmas current from her mom. Investigators had discovered her different orange sock close to the physique of Bobbie Jo, and so they knew then that the ladies nearly actually have been killed by the identical particular person.
However for almost 40 years, the id of their killer confounded police, regardless that he was inside their grasp the evening of the murders. It was solely when the killer was recognized a long time later that investigators discovered the bitter fact.
On the evening of the murders, authorities had launched an all-out effort to rescue a neighborhood miner, Alan Lee Phillips, whose truck grew to become caught in a raging snowstorm. It will be a long time earlier than police realized Phillips had, solely hours earlier than the rescue, killed Bobbie Jo and Annette.
Particulars of Phillips’ rescue and his crimes have been revealed throughout his trial this yr, the place he was convicted of two counts of first-degree homicide and different expenses.
Some recall that the climate on the evening of the murders was brutal, with temperatures plunging to unfavorable 20 levels Fahrenheit. When Phillips’ truck obtained caught in a snowdrift on a mountain move, he started utilizing his truck’s headlights to sign SOS in morse code. Extremely, a sheriff flying overhead on a industrial jetliner noticed the sign by way of the falling snow and alerted the crew, who radioed right down to dispatch on the sheriff’s workplace.
Dave Montoya, a neighborhood hearth chief, heard the decision and supplied to drive up the move. When he arrived, he was met with a well-known face. He had labored alongside Phillips within the mines. And on Phillips’ face, Montoya recollects, was a distinguished bruise. He instructed Montoya he obtained it when he fell whereas wandering round within the snow.
Police now imagine that Phillips obtained the bruise when Oberholtzer hit him within the face with a particular brass key ring made by her husband, Jeff. He particularly made it for her in case she ever encountered bother whereas hitchhiking.
Partly as a result of investigators didn’t imagine Jeff Oberholtzer had a strong alibi, he grew to become a suspect in his spouse’s homicide.
“48 Hours” contributor Natalie Morales interviewed Oberholtzer, and highlights the 40-year journey to deliver Phillips to justice in “Final Seen in Breckenridge.”
“To dwell beneath this cloud of suspicion for so long as you probably did, what did that do to you?” Morales requested Oberholtzer on location in Colorado.
Jeff Oberholtzer continued to reside within the space even after his spouse was murdered.
“It was very painful,” he replied. “Being beneath suspicion from not solely the authorities, but additionally being tried within the courtroom of public opinion. Folks did not desire a suspected assassin of their home.”
It will take a very long time for the total story to unravel, however Oberholtzer finally was cleared.
Because it turned out, Phillips’ first sufferer that January day was Annette Schnee, a housekeeper at a neighborhood Vacation Inn. After Annette left work, she visited a health care provider after which hitchhiked to a drug retailer in Breckenridge later that afternoon. Hitchhiking was quite common within the mountain cities again within the Eighties. Annette obtained some treatment on the drug retailer and was not seen after 4:45 p.m. that day.
Authorities now imagine Phillips picked up Annette in his truck.
A couple of hours later, at about 7:50 p.m., Oberholtzer disappeared. Oberholtzer was at a pub that evening with a number of mates, and at 6:21 p.m., she known as her husband, Jeff.
“She mentioned she’d be residence comparatively quickly … she mentioned she had a experience,” Jeff instructed “48 Hours.”
Jeff mentioned he fell asleep watching TV. When he awakened round midnight, and Bobbie Jo nonetheless was not residence, he felt one thing was terribly incorrect. He mentioned he went out searching for her, and tried to report her lacking. Breckenridge police instructed him they may not do something for twenty-four hours, so he returned residence.
Simply hours later, Jeff mentioned he obtained a name from a rancher within the space, who mentioned he had discovered Bobbie Jo’s license on his property. Jeff rushed over and, on his method, he mentioned he noticed Bobbie Jo’s distinctive blue backpack on the facet of the highway and stopped to retrieve it. He mentioned he additionally discovered two gadgets: Bobbie Jo’s proper glove, and a tissue, each of which had traces of blood.
Nobody knew it then, however a long time later, these traces of blood would lead on to Phillips. Police have at all times credited Bobbie Jo with combating again sufficient to attract that blood.
The subsequent day, Jan. 7, fearful mates shaped a search get together and went out on skis searching for Bobbie Jo. Round 3 p.m. that afternoon, they situated her physique in a snowbank the place Phillips had shot and killed her.
Jim Hardtke, then an agent for the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI), mentioned Bobbie Jo was totally clothed, and an post-mortem would later reveal she was not sexually assaulted. A pair of zip ties have been on one in every of her wrists. Not distant was that particular key chain made by Jeff.
There was one other merchandise discovered not removed from Bobbie Jo’s physique—an orange sock or bootie. It appeared to don’t have any direct connection to the crime scene, or no less than none that was readily obvious, in line with Hardtke.
“It was simply a type of mysterious issues that you simply choose up at against the law scene that you simply hold till you realize what it’s or by no means will discover out,” Hardtke mentioned.
One of many many twists within the case is that, at that time, authorities didn’t but know that Schnee was lacking. That they had by no means even heard her title.
It wasn’t till two days later — on Jan. 8 — {that a} co-worker of Annette’s known as Frisco police to report that Schnee had not come to work on the Vacation Inn for 2 days. That was very in contrast to Annette, mentioned her sister Cindy French.
Police traced Schnee’s actions to the drug retailer in Breckenridge, however there her path vanished. She appeared to have merely disappeared.
“Mother would simply say, ‘I simply wanna know why, how,'” French remembers. “‘And no one may give it to me. No one is aware of why or how.'”
However on July 3, 1982 — almost six months after Schnee was final seen alive — a younger boy out fishing came across her physique in a stream, about 23 miles from the place she was final seen in Breckenridge. Agent Hardtke attended the post-mortem. No bullet was recovered, however forensics confirmed that Annette was shot within the again as she was operating downhill towards that stream, authorities mentioned.
Hardtke suspected Annette had been sexually assaulted, but it surely was unattainable to inform given the period of time her physique had been within the stream. Hardtke primarily based his assumption concerning the sexual assault on the state of Annette’s clothes. The zipper on her denims was damaged and her footwear have been on the incorrect toes.
Throughout the post-mortem, Hardtke noticed one thing that may endlessly change the investigation.
“On her left foot, I observed an orange bootie,” he mentioned. “And in my thoughts, I am remembering the orange bootie that was discovered on the high of Hoosier Cross…very near the place Bobbie Jo Oberholtzer’s physique was discovered…so it tied the 2 collectively.”
As Hardtke instructed “48 Hours,” “Holy s***, that is wonderful. This ties…the instances collectively.”
In piecing collectively the timeline of occasions the day of the murders, detectives believed that Phillips first picked Schnee up hitchhiking, assaulted and killed her. Throughout that assault, Schnee misplaced her orange bootie in Phillips’ truck. Later that day, police imagine Phillips picked up Oberholtzer hitchhiking and tried to assault her as properly.
Detectives imagine that when Oberholtzer fought again and jumped from his truck, she kicked out the orange bootie left there by Annette.
The orange socks/booties satisfied police that they have been searching for one killer, however Phillips’ id remained hidden for many years. In early 2020, Park County Detective Sgt. Wendy Kipple heard about one thing known as genetic family tree, by which specifically skilled genealogists add a DNA pattern from against the law scene by way of publicly out there DNA databases.
Kipple submitted the DNA from the blood collected in reference to the Oberholtzer homicide to United Information Join, a genetic family tree firm situated in Denver.
“On Jan. 9, 2021, I get a cellphone name from the genealogist, and he says, ‘I’ve two extra names for you.'”
“And what have been the 2 names you got?” Morales requested Kipple.
“Alan Phillips and Bruce Phillips,” Kipple replied.
“And Bruce Phillips was the brother that by no means lived right here, did not have any ties to Colorado. And what did you find out about Alan Phillips?” Morales requested.
“Alan Phillips nonetheless lived close by,” Kipple mentioned. “He had labored right here in, within the mine, Henderson mine, for many years he labored there. He had his personal mechanic store. And he was nonetheless right here.”
Because it turned out, he was the particular person authorities had rescued that way back evening in a snowstorm, the person with the big bruise on his face. Nevertheless it took almost 40 years to attach that rescue sufferer to the person who killed Annette Schnee and Bobbie Jo Oberholtzer.
On Nov. 7 of this yr, Phillips was sentenced to 2 consecutive life sentences with out the opportunity of parole.
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