Dead Center: The Shocking True Story Of A Murder On Snipe Mountain

Dead Center: The Shocking True Story of a Murder on Snipe Mountain

Review"A fantastic story!" -- Carole Arnold, Carole Arnold Show KOMA-AM. December 8, 2003"A great book!" -- Jack Roberts, CRN National Radio, December 11, 2003"A gripping book ... dogged detective work. Three deadly bullets were greedy bride's gift to new husband." -- Globe Magazine, November 4, 2003"Profoundly interesting ... so interesting in the way it takes us into the heart of an investigation." -- The Morning Show, Greg Berg, WGTD-FM Milwaukee, Dec. 2003Daniels does a good job of delineating what it takes to conduct an investigation that builds a solid case. -- Rocky Mountain News, October 3, 2003Greed, betrayal, shocking conclusions.- Recommended for all those who enjoy true, inside stories of criminal investigations and the justice system. -- Cody's Books, September 2003The shocking true story of murder on Colorado's Snipe Mountain.Struck by three rifle bullets, newlywed John Bruce Dodson supposedly died in a hunting accident. But District Attorney Frank Daniels suspected Dodson's wife-and would stop at nothing to prove his suspicions before another man suffered the same fate.From Publishers WeeklyIn 1995, the body of Dodson was discovered by Janice, his wife of three months, lying dead near their campsite on Colorado's Snipe Mountain. An experienced hunter, Janice was taking her husband on his first trip to shoot deer and elk. Dodson had been shot three times and died from a bullet that went straight through his chest. Daniels, a district attorney in western Colorado and an expert on fossilized wood (Petrified Wood) investigated the case for four years. He concluded that Janice, with or without the help of her ex-husband, who was hunting in the same area, killed Dodson in order to inherit an estate valued at half a million dollars. Daniels recounts here the many interviews he and his team conducted and the forensic and ballistic discoveries they made that led him to successfully prosecute Janice for first-degree murder, although all of the evidence was circumstantial and the murder weapon was never found. Unfortunately, the author's writing and characterization skills do not match the suspense of this true crime story. Daniels paints Dodson as a good-natured victim while describing Janice as manipulative and disturbed, but neither character comes alive. The enormous amount of sometimes confusing detail Daniels presents did convince the jury of Janice's guilt, but does little to enliven this tawdry tale.Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.From the AuthorWith all other murder cases I have worked on in the past twenty years, once the trial and sentencing were over, I put the case behind me. This case was different. Even though the trial had been over for two years, I could not get this case out of my head. I also had another reason for writing this book. Although we convicted one person for murder, a few of the details continued to bother me. I have never been sure this person did it alone. I am hopeful that this book will bring forth new information about a possible accomplice, if indeed there was one. The initial investigation lasted over three years, but we kept working on it after the arrest to the time of trial, which was almost five years after the murder. It seemed that every time we sent evidence to the crime lab to be tested the results led to more questions, rather than providing answers. This was particularly true with the firearms evidence. At one point, well into the forensic testing, we exhausted the firearms analysis capabilities of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation and asked the FBI Lab for assistance. This is the only case I have worked on where I felt we could not have obtained the result without the help of FBI laboratory experts. This book is different from other crime related books in a few ways. Since I wrote it from the perspective of the prosecuting attorney, details of the investigation and trial take center stage. I trust the reader to b