Up next, a desperate
woman struggles to survive.
She was trying
to get to the phone.
Hard to say if that was before
or after she was sh*t.
Police have a solid suspect,
but he's got an airtight alibi.
This is not your
prototypical k*ller.
We were looking
everywhere to try to get
to the bottom of this mystery.
The k*ller knows
how to destroy evidence
and nearly succeeds.
I've had a number of cases
where individuals have tried
to obliterate the microscopic
marks produced by the barrel.
Luckily for forensic scientists,
some of these folks
don't know what they're doing.
Southern Pennsylvania is dotted
with numerous small towns
and communities centered
around farming and agriculture.
York County, Pennsylvania,
is right along the border
with Maryland
with a history that goes back
prior to the Civil w*r.
It has some involvement
in the Battle of Gettysburg.
Violent crime
is a rarity in the area,
so when, on a March
afternoon in 2010,
a 911 operator got a call with
no response on the other end,
it was assumed
to be an accidental call.
to be totally nothing,
either a kid
playing with a phone
or something along those lines.
It's nothing that would
raise an alarm.
The York County
Control hung up the phone
and called back
and received a busy signal,
so that means
that the line is still open.
The call was from a landline,
from the home of a 55-year-old
woman named Monica Schmeyer.
An officer responded
to the house,
located in a very remote area.
Monica's house is
located on the top of a hill.
You can only get there through
this kind of a winding driveway
that gets to the home.
Police arrived,
announced their presence,
but got no response.
The reason became clear
shortly after
they entered the residence.
So I was the second
one on scene.
She was on the floor
in the living room,
and she was obviously deceased.
We suspected a g*nsh*t wound
to the head,
but we weren't 100% sure
exactly what was going on.
The victim was
identified as Monica Schmeyer.
On the floor next to
her body was a single
The brand, Speer,
was plainly visible.
At first there was no sign
of a struggle in the house.
If anything jumped out
at the beginning,
it was possibly more of
a suicidal situation,
that it was possible
that she had k*lled herself.
That was the initial thought.
But a quick survey of the scene
put that theory to rest.
There was no g*n in the house.
Monica's face was bloody
and bruised,
indicating she'd been struck
in the head.
A blood trail across the floor
led to her body.
She had blood
on the inside of her thighs
that were in a pattern consistent
with dripping downward
into her inner thighs
as well as blood on the soles
of her feet in her socks.
So at some point in time,
she had gotten up
from where she had been sitting
and bleeding
and moved across the floor
towards the phone,
where she was ultimately k*lled.
In fact, it appeared
Monica's last act
was to call 911.
This provided a vital clue.
The 911 call becomes
so important
because they can
pinpoint exactly
when the call was made... 2:52.
How does that help them?
Well, it helps them narrow down
the time of death.
Police were puzzled.
No motive for this m*rder
was immediately apparent.
Her purse was found
inside the house.
There was lots of other
personal property.
There was cameras and cellphones
and TVs and VCRs.
Even stranger...
there were a lot of
white envelopes
all over the room,
and they were filled with cash.
Monica had an interesting way
of handling cash
and paying her bills.
She didn't trust banks,
so she kept cash in her home
whenever she needed it.
If the k*ller left
thousands of dollars behind,
m*rder would seem
to be the only motive.
But who would want
Monica Schmeyer dead?
It didn't take long
to find a suspect.
Experience shows that, you know,
if somebody's going to k*ll you,
they usually know you,
and it's usually someone
very close to you.
Monica Schmeyer
met her husband Jon
at medical school
in the late 1970s.
When they married,
she gave up her medical career
to be a stay-at-home mom
to the couple's two daughters.
Jon Schmeyer built a successful
ophthalmology practice.
Life, at least for a while,
was good.
According to Monica, Jon seemed
to develop a wandering eye,
and when she found out about it,
being a Catholic, as she was,
she didn't want
to get a divorce.
So she actually stayed with Jon
for a number of years.
Monica eventually
consented to a divorce,
at least on paper.
In Monica's mind,
regardless of what
the divorce papers said,
they were married, and they were
until death do they part.
When detectives
notified Jon Schmeyer
of his ex-wife's
execution-style m*rder,
his reaction struck them
as more than a little unusual.
It looked more like an act
than a natural reaction.
He would cry and then look up
and cry and look up,
and there were no tears.
And he would go from crying
to talking back to crying,
back to talking,
but there was never a tear.
Schmeyer readily admitted
he and Monica had issues.
He said he wanted to
move on from the marriage,
but Monica insisted on
being part of his life.
He was very frustrated
with the divorce,
how things were going.
It had been drawn out.
It had been a couple years
since they had split.
And Schmeyer was known
to complain about this.
Friends said that what
he found particularly galling
was not how much
he paid in alimony
but how Monica
insisted it be paid.
She didn't trust banks,
so Jon would pay Monica
in cash every month.
She would set that money aside,
apportioning it for her bills,
then she would go back to Jon,
give him that cash back,
and he would write the checks
to the utilities
or others
that she owed money to.
Try as he might,
Schmeyer couldn't free himself
from his now-ex-wife,
but he insisted he had nothing
to do with her m*rder.
Police knew,
practically to the minute,
when that m*rder happened,
and Schmeyer said
he had an alibi.
He was at a local restaurant
with a group of friends
who called themselves
the Orange Shorts Society.
The Orange Shorts Society,
which is a group
of middle-aged men
that get together once a week
at a local restaurant
and they would, you know,
talk about politics,
money, investments, whatever,
but they were all
well-to-do men.
On the afternoon of
Monica's m*rder,
most of the usual group met,
and they confirmed
Jon Schmeyer was there.
At first blush, it did seem
that he had an alibi,
but you could still be a
hire-for-m*rder type situation.
There seemed to be enough
bad blood there.
It would appear that
he could gain
substantially from her death.
So now investigators turned
to what little evidence they had.
An autopsy revealed Monica d*ed
from a close-range g*nsh*t
to the head.
A .32-caliber b*llet,
consistent with the casing
found at the scene,
was recovered
and forensically examined.
The general rifling
characteristics list
that was populated showed
that firearms produced
by Colt, Dixon,
and Kel-Tec were among
the firearms
that could have fired
this particular specimen.
While the b*llet was damaged,
it had sufficient markings to
match it to the m*rder w*apon,
if only that g*n could be found.
If you submit a g*n
or you submit a barrel,
then we can go
and test-fire those
and compare them
to this particular w*apon.
There were possible
witnesses to the m*rder.
Even though Monica's house
was well off the road,
a neighbor saw a man walking
in the direction of her house
shortly before she made
the 911 call.
About 20 minutes later,
the man appeared again,
walking away
from Monica's house.
He sees that same man
walking in...
what he described as
walking with a purpose,
carrying what he believed to be
a white envelope in his hand,
which then, you know,
we immediately say,
"Oh, white envelope.
White envelope."
We had white envelopes
at the scene with cash.
The man was described
as a white male,
approximately 5'9"
with a medium build.
A second witness said
he also saw a man
matching that same description
walking up a hill away
from Monica's house
and that he drove away
in a silver van.
Not a, you know, soccer-mom van,
not a big box truck,
but, like, a work van,
a work-type van
parked facing down the hill.
So far, these
witness descriptions were all
detectives had
to identify this man.
It couldn't be said for certain
if he even had anything to do
with Monica's m*rder
or if he had any ties
to Monica's ex-husband.
We'll come up with
this thing happened.
We got to find the right one
and be able to prove that one,
that's sort of the name
of the game.
The prime suspect in
the m*rder of Monica Schmeyer
was a man seen near her home
on the day of the m*rder.
Detectives focused on
the vehicle the man was driving,
a silver, full-sized van.
The witness who saw the van
didn't get a license plate
and didn't know
the make of the vehicle.
There were no
specific markings about it.
We found about 50 different
silver vans.
We had vans.
We don't know if we had the van.
Businesses in
nearby towns were canvassed.
Detectives hoped either man
or machine had seen the van.
Everybody has cameras,
everybody's, you know, banks
and stores and ATMs,
and, I mean, there's cameras
everywhere nowadays,
so it's a cursory thing for us.
We'll check all the video.
A bank in a town about
three miles from Monica's house
captured video
of a full-sized silver van
heading in the direction
of her house
about 15 minutes
before the m*rder.
We see that same van
twice on the video...
once prior to the time of death
and once after
the time of death,
corresponding the direction
of travel
as far as to and from the house.
But the video was blurry,
and attempts to enhance it
were unsuccessful.
There was no way to try to get
a license plate
or anything along those lines
because the camera itself
is designed
and focused on people
entering and exiting the bank,
not in the background.
Which put the investigation
almost back to square one.
Since Monica didn't date,
there were no ex- or current
boyfriends in the picture.
And the possibility of this
being a random m*rder
was dismissed out of hand.
You just didn't find
this house on a whim.
This was a house that you had
to know it was there.
We knew we had to find
a connection to Monica.
We just didn't know
what that connection was yet.
Searching for anything
he could have missed,
Detective Doug Demangone
reviewed his notes
and found something interesting
from his initial interviews
with friends
of Monica's ex-husband,
the members of
the Orange Shorts Society.
On the afternoon of the m*rder,
the group was joined
by a young woman named Sarah,
who was engaged to be married
to one of the members.
I'm going through my notebook,
and I'm getting to my interview
with Sarah
and I'm looking and I'm flipping
and I see the name Tim Jacoby at
the top of this piece of paper.
Tim Jacoby was the only
regular member
of the Orange Shorts Society
who wasn't present that day.
And I went, "Oh, my gosh."
I said, you know, "I never
really looked into this guy,"
and I then pull his driver's
license photo up,
and, again, "Oh, my gosh."
His height fits.
His description fits.
Everything fits.
Jacoby was 37 years old,
had a good job as an engineer,
and didn't appear, at first,
to be a cold-blooded k*ller.
And then, as you dug a little
deeper, oddly enough,
you found that he had
this armed-robbery history.
I find that he has
a prior robbery arrest,
where he involved a takeover
of a jewelry store,
where he ended up dropping
the jewelry as he was fleeing.
Jacoby pleaded no contest and,
with no prior criminal history,
escaped jail time.
Records showed he owned
a .32-caliber Kel-Tec
semi-a*t*matic p*stol.
The bells are going off now
because a .32 caliber
is what they're looking for.
That is the shell casing they
found at the scene of the crime.
While Jacoby
didn't know Monica...
detectives say
they had never met...
he did know of her
through Jon Schmeyer
and the Orange Shorts Society.
I take it to all of
our investigators,
and I say, "Here we go.
Tim knows Jon."
So, now, is this
a whole conspiracy
that Jon pays Tim
to knock off Monica?
So now we're back
in full throttle,
and we're moving ahead.
After weeks of frustration,
detectives finally had
a possible suspect
in the m*rder
of Monica Schmeyer.
Tim Jacoby fit
witness descriptions.
He knew where Monica lived,
and employment records showed
he was driving a company van,
a full-sized silver van
just like a witness saw
on the day of the m*rder.
It's the same make, same model,
same year, same color.
Everything, circumstantially,
when you look at it,
it's the same van as the one
we saw in the video
going towards
Monica's house at 2:38
and coming back through at 2:59.
A search warrant
was ex*cuted on Jacoby's home.
His live-in fiancée, Sarah,
didn't take it well.
She literally threw up.
When I was talking to her,
she got so worked up,
she was hyperventilating,
and she vomited
in a garbage can.
Detectives didn't find
a .32-caliber g*n,
but they did find a
The rest of the g*n
was nowhere to be found.
But the g*n barrel
would be consistent
with the m*rder w*apon.
There was one problem...
someone had scoured
the inside of the barrel,
an apparent attempt to destroy
it as a piece of evidence.
These particular marks
were probably produced
by a hard-surface tool
that was used to scratch
or to actually mark the lands
and grooves inside the barrel.
Test b*ll*ts were fired
through the damaged barrel,
but the scratches
apparently worked.
They prevented a definitive
match from being made
to the b*llet recovered
from Monica's autopsy.
The b*ll*ts lacked
sufficient microscopic marks
to render an opinion
of an identification.
Detectives now learned
that Jacoby often used
his parents' nearby farm
for target practice.
Teams of forensic analysts
descended on the property.
We found the box
to the Kel-Tec g*n.
We found the receipt
for the Kel-Tec g*n.
We found amm*nit*on
for the Kel-Tec .32.
But still no g*n.
However, in the area where
Jacoby did his target practice,
investigators found
four spent shell casings
from a .32-caliber.
It was hard to say how long
these casings had been there.
Once those particular cartridge
cases were cleaned up,
the examiner was able to see
that these were manufactured
by Speer.
They were .32 auto caliber,
the same as the cartridge case
that was recovered
at the scene of the crime.
In the same way that b*ll*ts
are made distinctive
by the g*n that fires them,
shell casings also
retain toolmarks
that are unique
to a particular w*apon.
Microscopic markings on
the base of the casings
were compared under a microscope
to the casing recovered
from Monica's living room,
and they matched.
The opinion that was
rendered was that,
in fact,
all of these cartridge cases
were fired
from the same firearm.
That definitively tied
Tim Jacoby,
or at least shell casings
on his parents' property,
to the fatal b*llet.
He was arrested and charged
with first-degree m*rder.
But one question remained.
Why would he k*ll someone
he didn't even know?
On face value, Tim would not
have had any reason
to k*ll Monica
unless hired by Jon to do so.
Investigators did a deep dive
into Jon Schmeyer's
financial records,
looking for any kind
of payment to Jacoby.
There was nothing there.
We were unable to substantiate
any kind of connection between
Jon, Sarah, and Tim.
And then it got to the point
where, okay,
we've now eliminated Jon.
Investigators believe
Tim Jacoby targeted Monica
not for m*rder, but robbery.
He knew there were
thousands of dollars of cash
laying around her house.
After all, his friend
Jon Schmeyer
complained about it
all the time.
I think he listened
to the stories.
I think he knew about the money.
I think he knew
about the envelopes.
Investigators believe
Jacoby drove to the house
that day in his silver work van.
He parked up the street,
entered the house,
and pointed the g*n at Monica
while he tried to scoop up
envelopes containing money,
but Monica fought back,
or tried to run away.
Jacoby hit her in the face,
knocking her to the ground.
As he looked for more envelopes,
it appears Monica crawled
to the phone and called 911.
Jacoby rushed over
and sh*t her in the head.
He took several envelopes
filled with cash
and walked back to the van,
where he was seen
by Monica's neighbors.
He got rid of the g*n,
but the shell casings
left earlier
at his makeshift target range
matched the single b*llet casing
next to Monica's body.
In October of 2014,
Tim Jacoby
was convicted of charges
including first-degree m*rder
and sentenced to death,
largely because of microscopic
toolmarks on shell casings
he apparently didn't
even know were there.
Jacoby remains on death row.
This case was definitely
a whodunit,
and in my 28 years
of law enforcement,
we didn't really get
a whole lot of good whodunits.
It took a lot of time and energy
to get to the bottom.
This was a challenge for
our little police department,
and luckily, and then happily,
it turned out good.
When we started, we had,
you know,
a thousand-piece puzzle,
and we didn't have
the edges done.
So, you know,
the forensic evidence
gave us the edges
and the middle,
and we were able to put all...
that whole picture together
so that when the jury looked
at those puzzle pieces,
they didn't see puzzle pieces,
they saw the picture on the box.