Seeking Justice and Accountability

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She had found something energy, a tracking device She had found cameras inside the house. You has no idea what I go through every single day with you No idea. I remember her saying, I don't know what else to do. I don't know where else to turn. It's been getting worse and it's been getting worse. I don't want him anywhere near me. You're describing a life lived in fear. Yeah Every time she was out of my sight, I was so scared for her I know this is going to be difficult for you Take me back to october eighth When did you realize something wasn't right She left the house that day that twentyoney after seven Ange was working at the Kennels. I texted into a quick notote. I didn't get a response. Then the sirens went off in town. Lw sir. twenty one. twenty one. I'm approaching the kennel now. I do see one vehicle out front, one vehicle And living in a small town, you're always kind of nosy and w to know what's going on. How far out is my assistant? I got on my phone. I don't like this. And I looked and it said Mississippi Ridge boarding kennels. shots fired Hello. And I immediately was hysterical. becausecause Angela Printchard was my sister Angie I don't know we got here, but we said possible shots fired. We actually got behind an ambulance on the way up there. Well Senter twenty one, we are gonna enter the building I more money one center twenty one, we we got lady down, lady down. And I got out of the cart. ink clear, see clear. I went running downown the hill There was police officers there. And I remember walking up to him And I said, Is she alive And they said no I immediately fell to the ground and I remember saying something like, I knew something like this was going to happen I knew it was, I knew it was. Los said to make sure you get it now point out for a suspect H you leave no rock unturned You leave no building unchecked. Obviously, we're gonna throw every resource that we have at our disposal to apprehending him. There was a knock on the door I'm not answering the door. He has a gun Jonathan Vigliatti reports, Could Angela be saved? On the morning of october eighth, twenty twenty two The serene Mississippi River town of Bellevue, Iowa. population about twenty five hundred woke up to a calamity News of an apparent homicide, the first in nearly a decade. build Dozens of investigators from six different law enforcement agencies were combing the crime scene at the Mississippi Ridge boarding kennels with body cameras rolling The woman who ran the Kennels, Angela Pritchard fifty five had been gunned down He knew how to get in the front door. Her sister, Wendy Buddy, believed she knew who was responsible. Angela's husband Chris Pritchard in that moment Did you know it was Chris one hundred percent one hundred percent, I knew it was him Wendy says Angela had been trying to leave him for months and lived in fear he would kill her This appeared to be an assailant that knew her very well Ryan Kedley and Dustin Henningson are spepecial agents with Iowa's DCI, the Department of Criminal Investigation Belleview' small police force with just several officers invited the state police to lead the investigation whileall Angeles' family was convinced Chris Pritchard was the killer The special agents had to connect all the dots We had received word that there was a nine hundred eleven call in the morning Tell me about that nine hundred eleven call. nine hundred eleven, whereere's your emergency It's essentially that you're listening to the end of her life. on the nine hundred eleven call Please Those were the last words spoken by Angela, and the first clue investigators had to identify her killer She says the name Chris on this call. Wh is Chris Fruce Rrichard, her estranged husband Ma'am, whereere are you at As the dispatcher continues to ask, what's your emergency, you can faintly hear somebody say When you listen to this nine hundred eleven call How do you process what you were hearing. On a personal level, it's a very difficult thing to listen to someone's end of life moments On an investigative level, that was a pivotal piece of evidence in the opening stages of the investigation. You guys din. It was a very violent scene passassing by the kennel door on the right, and this is the area where we initially get a firsthand glimpse of Angela's deceased body here on the floor Pools of morning light illuminated pools of blood surrounding her body Angela was lying face down in the kennel's washroom where she bathed the dogs. Brian Kedley photographed the scene She has a very large significant gunshot wound to the chest. close range at I would say very close range. There has to have been some very, very high emotions involved in that. You have Angela Pritcher deceased here. you have Chris Prichchard person of interest, nowhere to be found How do you track him down The special agents spotted a barely visible blood trail leading out of this room and then into the dog kennel area through this door. We believe our assailant traveled from that area through here, left some blood evidence and then likely went out this door directly in front of us. We're certainly trying to keep an open mind and determine that, okay, if Chris didn't do this, well then who did Digging into Chris Pritchard's life, the special agents soon learned about his volatile history with Angela. which included violence and violations of a restraining order But at this point All of the information seems to be consistent with Crisp being the guy that we need to locate As we continue to work the investigation, we began to establish our timeline. someome of the first video that places him on this property comes from this home over here. That's correct Investigators reviewed the footage starting at midnight, the day of the shooting. For hours, there was nothing to see But just after four AM There was something to hear You can hear dogs start to bark. We had determined that was most likely the point when he arrived at the kennels Henningson believes Chris Pritichard entered the kennels and lay in wait for nearly four hours. The first video that they really got was Angela coming down to work in the morning. And right up here, you're gonna see Angela start to pull down to the entrance at the Mississippi Bidge Boarding kennels pulling up to the kennel at seven hundred and thirty four. You can see her get out of her vehicle and she's gathering her belongings and then walking into the kennel itself. Angela Pritchard had less than six minutes to live. At seven thirty nine and forty three seconds, we heard a gunshot go off in the video At any point, do you clearly see Chris on any of these surveillance cameras Yes, we believe we see him leaving About two minutes after the gunshot at seven forty one The man they now suspected to be her killer, Chris Pritchard appeared and actually walking From the kennel area down to the fence area here behind me That makes us believe that this is the first area that we need to check Outside the kennels, miles of thick woods stretch to the horizon, an area the Northeastern Iowa locals call the wilderness. It was rugged terrain. Chris Pritchard knew well, says Wendy. He knows the outdoors. I knew that he could probably survive out there for Quite a while in Heidi We have every resource at our disposal to try and do this manhunt We have canines, we have airplanes, we have drones. This is your worst nightmare? Yeah, yeah. Everything you've been trying to prevent come true. 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That's shopify dot com slash Tinderfoot Shopify d. com slash Tinderfoot. So you've got a fugitive out there O the run, potentially armed. The manhunt for Chris Pritchard was widening. There's hundreds of acres here of farm andand and woods, and we have the Missippi River not far away. so knowing that he could have went any direction really makes the search difficult Fanning out from the kennels, heavily armed officers search nearby neighborhoods house to house. You guys know Chrisrer? Barn to barn. Is this the guy they're looking for? right there. Chris Prer Has he been known to come out here every once in a while? Yeah I haven't seen him though day Angela was a mother grandmother. She was What kind of mother and grandmother was she? I don't know that you would find somebody better than her You hear a lot of people say, people put their kids in front of themselves that was truly her Angela Pritchard's world revolved around family Especially her two sons and six grandchildren They were the loves of her life, her kids and her grandkids. And with almost equal billing Angela's five Huskies. She always was an animal lover. Angela's sons, Josh Close and CJ Hancock She was beautiful inside and out. She liked to make everybody happy Especially her family. She loved you so much, yeah She loved to spoil the grandkids rotten They could do no wrong in her eyes. She loved doing arts and crafts. She still decorated her tree with the ones we made when we were kids Making memories with their mom later in life was Chris Pritard, the very man investigators were now chasing Wendy Buddy and her husband Jim had known Prichchard for years I would have trusted them with our children S was nice, friendly, sincere, a hard worker Fun to be around Richard, a longtim Bellevue resident, was an established electrician in town. Soon, Angela found her calling to be a kennel owner, to do something with animals. I was thrilled for her. It really seemed like everything was falling into place. After dating for nearly two years, they moved into this Bellevue home and even got married here in march twenty nineteen The newlyweds were over the moon for about eight months When did ings chang. I truly think that things started to change when he lost his job Fired? Fired and charged with first degree theft, a felony After he allegedly stole thirty six thousand dollars worth of supplies from the electric company where he worked She was just beside herself, what are we going do now? We need that income Awaiting trial, Prichard was out on bail and out of work, says Wendy. He wasn't looking for work. He was definitely drinking more As the months went on, it I just was like, wow, he's really kind of changing Richard finally took some odd jobs and helped Angela at the Kennels But in the summer of twenty twenty one, Wendy says Angela discovered her husband was using methamphetamine And then I knew that things are really getting bad The simmering tension reached a boiling point on april eighteenth, twenty twenty two. She said Chris hit me. She said he's drunk, he's on drugs. So I told her, we're gonna call the cops. Bellevue pololice responded. The call recorded on police body cam. I just She was crying. She was visibly shaking. She had a mark on her face And she said, I'm so scared pololice didn't have to go far to find Pritcher. He was in the garage. State vateral law requires that somebody go to jail and it with theest I can't believe I'm going ye Well, she's got a mark on her face. Chris Pritchard was arrested and charged with domestic assault. He's very, very, very messed up on We've seen him change right in front of our eyes, haven't we Chris spent the night in jail and was released awaiting trial, staying with family Angelles sought and received a temporary no contact order. So he can't come back here. No The no contact order now exists protecting your sister But a few weeks later, It's lifted. Even after it happened, she said, I don't want this. I want our marriage to work eachach had been married before But it hoped this would be their last marriage, says Wendy Angela withdrew the no contact order. I believe he said everything that needed to be said for her to that order, the drinking will stop. He will be home more Promises he failed to keep, says Wendy. She said, I'm scared of them Eespecially if he's been drinking Wendy says Angelo was furious when she found a tracking device in her car. and two hidden cameras in the house I told her you need to get a divorce. You need to be done with this, Ange. Chris Pritcher seemed to have vanished in the vast wilderness. Even the police dogs had lost his scent, says Dustin Henningson. How do you find somebody that doesn't wantna be caught? This is where our local resources really help us. Right from the start, Henningson had corralled state and local law enforcement agencies, even farmers and hunters help determine where he might be. I'll let you know if I see anything or hear anything. If we thought that Chris was going to make his way, say back to Bellevue What's the most likely path? Where are his friends at It's a small town, every town Cattle farmer Jeff Junk and girlfriend Kim Klein were once close friends with Chris Pritchard Neighbors called them about the rumor racing through town Richard had shot his wife, Angela Get out of here. I didn't believe it A Jackson County Chief deputy stopped by Junk's house to warn them Richard was on the run and might be looking for help from his friends Then There was a knock on the door An The knock on the front door, the one they'll always remember, came around eight fifteen on October night, Kim Klein says. She and boyfriend Jeff Junk, were not expecting company. When the second knock happened, I says, I believe it's Chris And you need to answer the door So you open the door and what is it that you see on the other side? I see Chris Chris Pritchard, their old friend, now a hunted fugitive suspected of murder, was standing in the dim light, holding a shotgun stuff goes, you need to hand that gun to me And is no problem. Jeff and Kim knew they had to call the police But until they could do that safely, Kim says they were playing along Chris told them he'd been running all day from the cus and their dogs just said, Hey, dude,, you know, you shot your wife. Oh yeah, how's she doing The couple told him, Angela was dead Did he express any remorse they. He was sitting here laughing and drinking and they were talking about old times The moment felt so surreal, Kim says She snapped a photo just to show that No, he wasn't having any remorse He never talked about her the rest of the night And then I took the one when he passed out And the time was finally right, says Jeff, to text the chief deputy, who had stopped by earlier I said, he's on pare and he is passed out, come get him When police arrived around midnight, Chris was still in the lazy boy chair Cold He didn't know What was coming? with you guys? Chr I was sleeping. He's verbally belligerent to officers that have arrested him. Looks like he's got cut to his left thumb. Special Agent Henningson collected the evidence Chris Pritchard had left behind. twenty gaage shotgun and his torn clothes. He took Angela's possessions, money, a cell phone with him I think we're going to go in then. Special agent Kedley escorted Pritcher to the Jackson County jail Do you want your seat belelt, Chris? I wantna bow in my head Shortly after one AM on october ninth A despondent Chris Pritchard was booked into the county jail, eventually charged with first degree murder and robbery. After hours on the run through Iowa's wilderness, have look at me. Rrichard found himself surrounded by concrete and steel, largely put there by the weight of a single worird I pase get A me here Wendy says the day Pritard ended her sister's life followed months of increasingly erratic behavior and escalating rage, which Angela had documented Tell me about This journal. and her words that lived on She was this sticky noe queen Dozens of Angelist's brightly colored sticky notes told a dark story The scribbled entries became Angela's diary of domestic abuse August twenty third text message, calling me names, saying it's going to get real He's been stalking me and watching me Very scared of him. I think Chris is capable of anything. booze and drugs every day. said he doesn't give up He goes to jail. alwaysways looking over my shoulder to see if he's around Her words to me or I'm done This is it We're not living in the same house Wendy invited her sister to move in with her Angela gratefully agreed I was like, you have a shadow now because I'm not leaving You're stuck with me The next day, Angela requested a second temporary no contact order, granted september first, twenty twenty two. A no contact order means just that. No contact of any kind with the protected person In the state of Iowa, a single violation requires a mandatory arrest But that doesn't stop, Chris Once that second no contact order got put in place I would say that's when things went really downhill. And it was in place when Angela went back to the home she once shared with Chris Pritchard to pick up a few things, says Wendy I was with her. You were with her along with police. The Bellevue police were there just in case Pritichard showed up. The court had ordered him to move out temporarily We walked in the front door The house was destroyed There was ink and paint their own everywhere. picture frames broken furniture was destroyed. He had actually taken the mattress off her bed and rubbed it in dog feces guns And he pled them all over the house to intimidator I mean, we both just started crying This is in clear violation of the restraining order. What do the police do? The police said there's nothing we can do. This is his house. Nothing we can do is what they say to you. This is his house as well Under Iowa law, with a no contact order in place Bellevue Police should have taken Prichard's guns For reasons unknown, he was allowed to keep them Wendy and Angela's sons say throughout September, the frightening violations continue physical assault Psychological terror sitting outside of her house Following her teexting her. stalking her goingo and cutting the grass at the kennels while she wasn't there Bellevue Police arrested Pritard just once on september fifteenth for sending Angela a text message, another violation of the no contact order He spent one night behind bars before posting bail The next dceays Wendy He resumed his flurry of offenses He had been driving by her house multiple times. One night, says Wendy Richard drove by. Six times in one hour I don't feel safe anymore anywhere. My sisters My house, my sons's doors in town. You have a ticking time bomb on your hands? Yeah, prettyret much and that's what it felt like But instead of making arrests, the Bellevue police were making excuses. S. Angeles' ss for not enforcing the law They said that they'd tell him to knock it off or have a talk with him Nothing,othing was done and she was terrified You're reaching out to place They're not doing anything. Are you running out of hope here Yes. What do you do when nobody's willing to help you Fear for my safety, fear for my life He has guns The fear it consumed our life Let's be honest, traditional banks have a habit of hitting you with overdraft and monthly fees, and those costs can really add up when you're just trying to manage your own money. But Chime is changing the way people bank. They offer the most rewarding fee free banking built for you, not the one percent. 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It only takes a few minutes to sign up It was five AM at the Jackson County Jail twenty one hours after Angela was found dead Richard waived his miranda rights and talked about the encounter at the dog kennels with spepecial agents Dustin Henningson and Ryan Kedley She said, you gott to leave, you got to leave now or I'm going to call the police. I said, I just want to talk And she shoved me. And I hit the cabinet. It the gun I don't what the gun hit, but it went off So in so many words, he says, I shot Angela It was an accident Essentially, yes. Are you believing any of this? No I'm only believing the fact that he shot Anntla Richard pleaded not guilty to first degree murder and robbery charges. His trial began february seventh, twenty twenty four We believed that Mr. Pritcher planned this all out and very meticulously for that matter To prove premeditated murder Prosecutors Nicole Leonard and John Kees told jurors Rrichard put his plan in motion on october seventh, twenty twenty two. The day before he shot his wife, the same day Angela's temporary restraining order became permanent We believe that that was sort of the snapping point for the defendant. He became more and more obsessed with the situation and not letting her go. She wanted to drag me through the mud and make me a monster before taking Angela's life. Richard took steps to cover his tracks, say the prosecutors He borrowed this white pickup truck to avoid using his own vehicle So what we think was he was setting up an alibi. Prosecutors say Pritchard secretly parked the borrowed truck inside a barn belonging to Laurie and Mike Blazer just a few miles from the Mississippi Ridge booarding Kennels We walk in You know, notice this white pickup truck with a note from Chris Prichchard, saying he had gone hunting. keeys are on the truck if you need to move it. I'll be back Chris We knew Chris. he would tell us how much he loved Angela, how devastated he was that there was a restraining order. The blazers would soon become crucial witnesses for the prosecution Shortly after finding the truck and note They heard the news about a shooting Dog kennels We knew the minute that there was a shooting at the kennel, something had happened with Chris. We were concerned that this was a getaway vehicle for him in here because it was just so odd. it had no reason to be here called nine hundred and eleven immediately. I see you guys are looking for Chris Prusher is in our garage Let's just get this cleared first. It was very intense because at that point, he was still missing. And we were scared to death Clear here, Jim. Prosecutors later viewed home surveillance footage from a camera on the blazsers's property, showing Chris Pritchard entering the barn, where the blazsers kept their horse trailer. The minute we came in the door, I knew that Chris Rrichard had spent some time in here He certainly made himself at home here. Richard left the horse trailer in the middle of the night, hiking through the dense woods to the kennels, says prorosecutor Leonard. We believe his next appearance is around four AM on october eighth at the dog kennels in which the dogs start to go crazy And you believe from that point forward, he's inside the kennel. Correct I think he always had the plan to murder her To prove it, the prosecutors played audio clips from Pritard's police interviews for the jury You show up at a place where you know she's gonna be. You've got a gun with her. You know you've got a no contact order An argument breaks out, She calls nine hundred eleven. She winds up dead. This wasn't just some accident If this was an accident, why are you taking her cell phone, which is her only means of survival? Why aren't you calling for help yourself? Why aren't you rendering any type of aid for your wife? And Prichard kept adding details to the story of the accidental shooting, say the special agents. The gun was leaning up against the cupboards. He went to retrieve a backpack and it fell, and then that went off and shot her But at trial, an Iowa State medical examiner testified the gunshot had a downward trajectory Meaning Pritchard had the weapon in his hands and was standing when he fired They prosecutors It look like a computer in the arm How would you die from thatath Angela was shot dead center in the chest, testified the medical examiner. and died in seconds I would love to have stuck around me Beny and her temper. I thought maybe it didn't even really hate her that bad ' she was yelling at me like she wasn't even hurt the fact that he's saying that afterfter the gun went off and it struck her that she's yelling profanities back at him. Well, we have a nine hundred eleven recording of that conversation that did not take place Prosecutors say Chris Pritchard's last words on the nine hundred and eleven call prove his actions were premeditated, a final explosion of violence. when you hear his statement standing over her dying body on that nine hundred eleven call using profanity You definitely don't say. What he said at the end of the phone call after you accidentally shoot someone Richard's defense attorneys, who declined our request for an interview Maintained the shooting was accidental And the case against Pritard was a rush to judgment After four days of testimony, the case went to the jury. We were outside the courthouse just kind of stretching and You know, the jury's back This man was also waiting for the verdict and already preparing for another trial, a federal lawsuit against the Bellevue Police Department. failed Angela, he says Time and time again. If police took action Would Angela be alive today? Absolutely There are people you are told to trust, lawyers, teachers, especially doctors. But what happens when you put your life in someone's hands and they betray you The hit podcast Doctor Death is B, and this season is unlike any other. Doctor Death The Cowboy is the story of a charming neurosurgeon who rode into western towns, selling a persona of confidence and care. He wore cowboy boots in the operating room and became sought after by patients he promised to heal Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies. This season is about a doctor who was never truly held accountable patients whose lives he ruined, a story of greed, betrayal, and a fight for justice that will leave you questioning who to trust. Listen to Dr. Death the cowboy, wherever you get your podcasts, or binge the entire series right now only with Audible Evening by his remorse Buy a new car 'll be moving Let's get started. Sorry, I think there's been a mistake. I bought it from Carvana. You what? Yeah, great price. I even have seven days to love it or return it. So there's no No, no buyer's remorse. More like buuyers rejoice? I guess I'll let myself out. Congratulations. I mean it. Buyers rejoice. Buy your car today on Carbana. Limitations exlusions may apply S you here sevenay return policy at cararbana d In february twenty twenty four, sixteen months after Angela's death. Her family's wait for a measure of justice was over It's got to be a good sign that they're back in less than an hour The jury found Chris Pritchard guilty of first degree murder and robbery When they said it, it was just How big s that your relief In March, Pritard was sentenced to life in prison without parole will never bring her back. He's gonna to spend the rest of his life behind bars also gave a victim impact statement and I said to him I hope while you're behind bars, you always have to look over your shoulder and be scared for everything you do. she felt, I hope you just feel tiny bit of that. The way you tortured her Civil rights attorney Dave O'Brien represents Angela Pritchard's family She would be alive today, he says, if the Bellevue Police Department had enforced a judge's order of protection You filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Bellevue and three officers because they didn't do their job And it's it's that simple That lawsuit lists multiple failures to arrest Chris Pritchard. O'Brien says this led to what's called a state created danger Meaning the officers's alleged inaction and indifference actually increaseed the threat to Angela Pritchard Can a police officer decide Should I arrest him or not? Is it up to their discretion? Absolutely not here in Iowa On a judge can show discretion not to enforce this restraining order Starting september first, twenty twenty two, when Angelles's second No contact order was issued, until her murder thirty seven days later, Chris Pritchard violated the restraining order repeatedly, says O'Brien dozen times during this relevant time period