Cold Case Files - Blood Red Snow

Episode Date: February 25, 2025

When 19-year-old Chris Green is found beaten to death in a snowy Bangor, Michigan ditch in 2002, his family fear their son's murder will never be solved. Years pass before shocking revelations from an informant emerge and blow the case wide open. Dipsea - Visit Dipseastories.com/COLDCASE to start your free 30-day trial! Homes.com: We’ve done your homework. Progressive: Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Rosetta Stone: Cold Case Files listeners can get Rosetta Stone’s lifetime membership for 50% off when you go to RosettaStone.com/coldcase 

Hi, cold case listeners. I'm Marissa Pinson. And if you're enjoying this show, I just want to remind you that episodes of cold case files as well as the A&E classic podcasts, I survived, American justice and city confidential are all available ad free on the new A&E crime and investigation channel on Apple podcasts and Apple plus for just $4.99 a month or $39.99 a year. And now onto the show. The following episode contains intensely disturbing accounts of violence. Listener discretion is advised. Christopher was very goofy. He would always do things to try to make somebody laugh. I had no idea that anybody had any ill will against my brother. It was a shock. The level of anger and rage that was involved I had no idea that anybody had any ill will against my brother.

It was a shock, the level of anger and rage that was involved in this particular death. He was ambushed and attacked. The attack was vicious, it was violent, it was quick. He was just left in the ditch to die like a piece of trash. Investigators began to see a lot of potential suspects who lived in the area. As time goes on and nobody's being charged, are we going to not ever know what happened? You want answers and you want answers now.

There are over 100,000 cold cases in America. Only about 1% are ever solved. This is one of those rare stories. It's December 9, 2002, in Bangor area, Michigan. Michael McKay is a former trooper with the Michigan State Police. It was a typical Michigan winter day. You know, ground was covered with snow. Very cold day. Being as close as we are to Lake Michigan, there is that lake effect snow.

At the time, I'd been a state trooper assigned to the Fitt district for about five years. We had just started an afternoon shift about 3 p.m. and we were just a couple of minutes in when we got the call from central dispatch. Caller told central dispatch that they thought the man was dead. Is he conscious? I'm not messing with the man.

I'm not messing with him. OK. Kevin Conklin is a former detective with the Michigan State Police. 60th Street in Bangor Township is very rural. It's a quiet place, especially during the winter. People are not out as much. We didn't have a lot of murders. And so I'm thinking, you don't know, medical emergency, a hit and run. When we arrived, we could see the body in the ditch.

Victim was a white male, thin guy, that he had been stabbed in the skull, in the body multiple times. This was a very, very brutal assault. Clearly, this was a murder. During the course of the investigation with all the police vehicles parked, one of the neighbors noticed this commotion, came to inquire as to what was going on, and he identified

his son as the person in the ditch. And he was identified as Christopher Green. Jennifer Green is Christopher's sister. It was about six o'clock in the evening and I heard a news story come on about, you know, somebody had been found on the side of the road, really close to where my parents live. I just had this uneasiness about me. I called the house and my dad answered the phone. I said, do you guys know what's going on?

And he's like, I can't talk about it right now, but it was your brother. And when I heard that, my heart sank. It was very hard. And in that moment, I had to process the best way that I could. process the best way that I could. How did you learn about the marriage? Your brother was killed.

When I went to my parents' house, I found out that he had been murdered and left on the side of the road. Christopher was just 19 years old. I was protective of Christopher. You know, he was my baby brother. As a child growing up, he had a problem with one of his aortas in his heart, and so that made it very difficult

for him to do any strenuous activities. Christopher was definitely resilient. He was like, it is what it is. I'm gonna just do life the way I can do life. So we would ride our bikes down the road and we went camping, fishing. He was very goofy. He would always do things to try to make somebody laugh. Yet he loved to play Barbies with me, which was most younger brothers

wouldn't do anything like that. I couldn't fathom that anybody had any ill will against my brother. Who would do something like this and why? They didn't have a ton of information. It happened around 11, 12 o'clock in the afternoon. Christopher had decided to walk down to his friend's house. He never made it home. This case was unusual in this area in that we didn't have a lot of murders.

And even when we did, usually there was some other criminal activity that this was tied to. Rebecca Burkert is a local journalist. That's what was really strange about the crime that Christopher was the homicide victim. He was a quiet kid and his family was a quiet family, good people. Chris Green, he was stabbed multiple times and beat with a large stick. It was almost a tree limb. It was almost a tree limb. It was such a brutal crime, brutal assault. Looking at the crime scene, it was obvious to me

that the victim knew the assailant. Somebody really was angry at Chris Green and left him there to die. At the crime scene, police find Christopher's glasses in the roadway, a few feet away from his body. Being that it was winter and that the roadway was snow covered, it gave us some clues initially that you wouldn't have had on dry roads. It became clear that this began on the roadway and then continued to where the body was found in the ditch. Because it was snowing, we could see there were footprints leading away from the scene to the north.

The footwear belonged to a larger person. It appeared to be a tennis shoe of some sort. They were able to follow the footwear impressions for quite a distance, but eventually, due to the vehicle traffic, tracks were lost. In the brush, near where the footprints disappear, police recover what appears to be the murder weapon. There was a knife, right? The blade is still at the scene, but the handle's gone. Followed with that notion that someone did this quickly, viciously, didn't take

the time to either look for the blade or just didn't notice because they were in such a rage. We could see the blood on the knife. It's critical to collect all the blood that you see. You don't know if this is victims, suspects. As the crime scene is processed, detectives question the man who called 911. They identified Howard Butler as being the caller. Howard Butler, who lived directly across from where Chris was found,

he said he returned home from getting some parts for a vehicle, saw something suspicious in the ditch, got out, looked, saw a body. In any investigation, you always want to talk to the person that made the call to the police. You want to get that information, what they saw, what information they know why they called. Talking to the detectives, Howard Butler said he didn't notice anything suspicious. He said he wasn't home at the time. But according to his statement, his live-in girlfriend was home that afternoon. So I went to the home. It was older, unkept. A woman answers the door. She was maybe early

30s. And as I'm talking to her, I can smell bleach. I've looked down and she had white shoes on and there's a giant spot of something red. Now there's a murder victim across the street and I smell bleach, which of course would be the most common way to get rid of blood evidence. I'm looking at what appears to me to be blood on her shoe. And so I ask her, what's going on here today? And she says, well, we're just doing some cleaning today. I'm thinking maybe this is part of a cover-up.

I'm thinking, I have solved this murder. So I made contact with this woman and her home was within a football field of where Christopher Green was murdered. And I see this red blotch that appears to me to be blood. So now I'm thinking, this is absolutely tied to the murder. She told me her name was Jamie Crawford. She didn't seem to be unusually nervous.

She was polite enough, allowed me to come in. She says, they were doing some cleaning today. And I thought, this home had not been cleaned in a long time. And then she says, we're painting the bathroom red. Again, I'm thinking, maybe this is part of a cover-up, the things that people will come up with to cover crimes. She was cooperative, let me take a look around. Sure enough, they looked like they'd been cleaning. Sure enough, they were painting a bathroom red. Jamie claims that she didn't see anything out of the ordinary that day.

It's possible she didn't notice anything unusual. If you're in your home not paying attention, TV or music's on. She let me take her shoe. I brought that to the state police lab. They also want to confirm Howard Butler's story that he was coming from an auto parts store. The police got their information so that we could follow up later. They said detectives are going to want to be talking to you, which they said was fine. No problem.

Meanwhile, back at Christopher's home, his family provides detectives with a possible lead. So Christopher, in the summer of 2002, he was working at a blueberry farm and had met Lisa cousins. She lived down the street from us. They started dating. I don't know that it was anything serious, but for whatever reason, Lisa's dad, Floyd, did not like Christopher. I had had contact with Floyd many times when I was in uniform.

Usually it was either someone calling the police about Floyd, being aggressive or threatening. He didn't want Lisa and Christopher together. He was very adamant, warned Christopher, it was best that he stay away. According to his family, Christopher also made a troubling comment just a few weeks before his death. Christopher said that if anything ever happens to me,

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Eric Jenkins is a former assistant prosecutor for Van Buren County. Floyd, at one point, got angry with Christopher and tried to drive him off the property. This seems to be where this idea that Christopher was worried about Floyd was coming from was this argument. When you have a murder victim that says before their death, if something happens to me, this is where you need to look.

That was very unusual. Investigators at the time did contact Floyd Cousins. He was not very cooperative, wasn't volunteering information. But he made it crystal clear that he didn't want to see Chris Green at his house and or dating his daughter. When police spoke with Floyd, his alibi was unverifiable. It was just that he was at home. He was alone. With information that Floyd didn't have a good alibi and actually had a reason to wanna cause harm to Chris Green, he was now strongly looked at as being a suspect.

However, there was no direct evidence that tied Floyd Cousins to the actual crime scene. Investigators take a look at his shoes. None of the shoes that he owned matched the trademarks that were found at the scene of Christopher Green's murder. Of course, the fact that investigators can't find the shoe doesn't mean that they're not a suspect. People destroy evidence.

Floyd Cousins will remain on the investigators' radar. In the meantime, his daughter Lisa mentioned something that sparks their interest. Lisa detailed an incident that had happened relatively close in time to the murder where there was an argument with Christopher and a person named Ray Berry. This was about two weeks before this murder occurred. The argument started when Christopher said something that Lisa took issue with and Ray, who had had a romantic interest in Lisa's cousins, seeing himself as the knight in shining

armor sort of stepped in. A neighbor reported that the two guys looked like they were ready to square off against one another. At that point, law enforcement, once they identified that Ray Berry was a person of interest, did some digging into his background. Ray Berry was very athletic. He was an all-state wrestler. Ray was very charismatic, a happy-go-lucky type of guy, but he also had a dark side.

Ray Berry was somebody who was sort of described as a Jekyll and Hyde. People in the community knew him as a gentle giant on one side. However, there was a switch that people knew that could get thrown with Ray, where he would snap and go into what was described as an incredible hulk, this different person

that could be very violent and very dangerous. It was discovered that Ray Berry already had an active warrant out for his arrest for destruction of property. At that point, detectives absolutely wanted to speak with Ray Berry. But when they went to Ray Berry's house, there was no answer at the door. In talking with witnesses, they determined that Ray Berry fled the scene.

The fact that he had warrants. You have to figure out whether or not that's the reason why he skipped out, or is it because he was involved in the murder of Chris Green. The fact that Ray Berry was missing, that was very suspicious. This is someone that had to be found. Detectives put the word out on the street. Ray Berry was found to be riding around

by troopers on a traffic stop. He was actually located a short distance from his house. Detectives were called to the scene, started asking Ray Barry questions about Christopher Green case. He stated he did have the warrants on another case. That's why he had fled the residence. When people have warrants, they don't want to be around law enforcement. One of the things about Ray's interview that was interesting to investigators was they asked him about his shoes to potentially compare to the prints found at the crime scene.

Ray indicated that the shoes he was wearing were the only shoes that he owned. They didn't match up to any impressions that were found at the crime scene. That was very suspicious. In Michigan, winter can be very, very cold. Yeah, that's very unusual that somebody from Michigan would not have a pair of boots of some sort, something to keep your feet warm, other than an old ratty pair of tennis shoes. Another thing about the interview with Ray Berry is that the alibi he gave was unverifiable. He said that he was at home, but no one was around.

Certainly, this evidence is starting to point more strongly towards Raymond Ray Berry. However, there was no direct evidence linking him to the crime scene. Police arrest Berry for the property destruction charges, and in the days that follow, results from the blood on the murder weapon come in. The hope is that the murderer left some blood. As it turned out, all of it was the victims. None of it was the suspects. The autopsy report is also released. There was evidence to indicate that he was trying hard to fight back.

The victim sustained multiple stab wounds and cuts all over his body, multiple defensive wounds to his hands and arms. He also sustained lacerations to his skull. But it was determined that Christopher Green actually died of blunt force trauma. Eventually, the knife broke, so it was believed the suspect found a nearby tree limb and used that to brutally beat the victim to death. It was a shock, the level of anger and rage that was involved in this particular death. After the autopsy had been performed, the body was released back to the funeral home

and they invited us in to see Christopher. Even though they fixed him up the best that they could. He didn't look like himself at all. His face had been disfigured quite a bit. We opted for the closed casket. We couldn't, as a family, open the casket for anybody to see him like that. When we had the funeral, I was thinking about what was going through his mind. As a family, open the casket for anybody to see him like that.

When we had the funeral, I was thinking about what was going through his mind as he fought for his life. What was he thinking? It really took me to a dark place. You want answers and you want answers now. As the investigation nears the end of the first week, there's an unexpected development involving the suspect who called 911. In the course of the investigation, detectives go back to confirm Howard Butler's story that they were coming from the auto store. They later discovered some discrepancies with that story. Our detectives found out he wasn't at that auto parts store.

So detectives went back to the house to find Howard Butler. They're met by a roommate with news. He tells detectives that Howard had slipped out during the middle of the night. Police also make a discovery about Howard's girlfriend, Jamie Crawford. Come to find out, she was gone. She had disappeared.

But also Jamie Crawford turns out to be a false name. Howard Butler and Jamie Crawford, who lived directly across from where the Chris Green homicide happened, they escaped during the night. Are they running? What has he got to hide? You have to figure out why they don't want to be there. And then Jamie Crawford lied about her name.

All of that was very suspicious. Jamie Crawford, we later found out, was Jamie McDonald. And at the time we were talking, had a warrant out for her arrest for a drug crime. They determined that Howard also had warrants for his arrest. Maybe that's the reason they fled. This case was unusual in that in this small area, we had an interesting group of people.

There was a multitude of suspects that lived within two miles of our victim in the crime scene, first being Howard Butler and Jamie Crawford, who lived directly across from where Chris was found and fled the scene. Next you had Floyd Cousins. He had threatened Chris not to come around. And Ray Berry, who is also a neighbor, lives about 150 feet from where the body was located. The 5th District Fitive team was contacted, and they were eventually able to locate Howard Butler

and Jamie McDonald. — At the station, detectives confront Howard about his fake alibi. — As the investigators looked further into this, they did realize he was being forthcoming about where he was, that Howard had gone to a different auto zone in the area. But through the interviews with the clerks, along with a receipt,

it did confirm that Howard Butler was there to buy auto parts. Sometimes it's very frustrating for law enforcement. Some people don't understand that details are important. The exact store, exact travel route that you took, those things matter. Police also received the lab results on the red substance spotted on the footwear of Howard's

girlfriend, Jamie. After taking the shoe from Jamie, they were able to confirm that it wasn't blood on the shoe, that it was actually red paint. Investigators began to realize that a lot of the invasive answers that the two had given earlier had to do with the fact that they both had warrants. Eventually, police were able to eliminate Jamie McDonald

and Howard Butler from the suspect pool to just two key people. After clearing Howard Butler and Jamie McDonald, this left two suspects for the detectives, Floyd Cousins and Ray Berry. The problem was still that even though there were two good suspects in Floyd Cousins and Ray Berry, police had not found enough concrete evidence at that point to seek charges for the murder of Christopher Green. Eventually, no new leads or tips came in, and with a multitude of other cases coming

into the office, things got pushed to the back burner, so to speak. A year after Christopher Green's murder, with no new leads, the case goes cold. What are you looking at right now? I am looking at pictures of Christopher. He loved cats. He was the best thing when I was little. It's absolutely unfair that Christopher's no longer here. He deserved a life, and it was taken so early from him.

Christopher's death, it really put this huge cloud over the family. At the time I was 20, I couldn't go back to school. Every part of the drive in me just died. My dad was just, he was a very much quiet man, and he didn't talk much about what was going on. My mom, it pulled her in a dark place. As the years went on, there's nothing new, nobody's being charged.

It was like, is anybody gonna do anything? You know, will there be any justice? I was reassigned to the Bangor area in 2010, where I eventually became introduced to this case. When a Michigan State Police cold case team got involved later on in this investigation, they're now looking for technology that was not available in 2002. Also, they're looking for people who maybe follow up interviews. As time goes by, people begin to talk, people hear rumors, they hear things

that might change what they recall about a situation. The team focuses on the two suspects who were never cleared, Floyd Cousins and Ray Berry. We make sure that there weren't any stones unturned by reviewing his main reports, detective notes, going through all your witness statements. Detectives noticed something odd in Ray Berry's files. Reports indicated that Ray received a new pair of New Balance tennis shoes from his father a few days prior to the homicide.

Ray was very proud of his tennis shoes. Being from a poor family, new shoes were kind of a big deal. It was later learned through a family member of Ray's that the day of the murder, Ray had lost the shoes. So that was very odd to have happened, considering how proud he was of the shoes. Investigators, the radar was definitely peaked by this statement. But what stuck out to them was that Ray Berry told

investigators and the shoes he was wearing, he said were the only pair of shoes that he owned. This was in 2002. So basically, Ray Berry was caught in a lie. Are you ready to unlock a world of opportunities? Imagine confidently ordering tapas in Barcelona, negotiating business deals in Mandarin, or simply connecting with your neighbor in their native tongue. With Rosetta Stone, these scenarios aren't just dreams, they're your new reality. I've been using Rosetta Stone to learn Spanish, and I'm amazed at how quickly I've progressed. Their immersive approach feels natural, just like how we learned our first language.

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tread mark patterns found at the scene with New Balance shoes. The databases for these manufacturers of footwear are very large now compared to what they were back then. The footwear was identified as being a New Balance shoe. It was a vital piece of evidence that the shoe marks found at the scene were linked to different tread patterns

for New Balance shoes. And then on the other end of this, Ray Berry owns a pair of New Balance shoes. Is it a complete smoking gun? No. Investigators were still looking for something to really solidify that he was their suspect. It's now July 2011, nine years after Christopher Green's murder. The more time passes then, in 2011 detectives get what could be a big break. I was contacted by a subject about the Chris Green homicide.

He said he had information that he knew would solve this case. The informant's name is Claude Taylor. He is Ray Berry's half-brother. Claude Taylor had gotten into some trouble for some breaking and entering cases, and he was looking to get some leniency on the case in exchange for his testimony. He told us how Ray Berry showed up that evening of the homicide, was acting real nervous. Claude said that he had been watching the news and that there was a body discovered in Bangor.

Ray, when he came over, indicated that the victim was Christopher Green. And then Ray went one step further and advised that he had been involved in the murder. Detective Conklin tells Ray's half-brother that he'll agree to a plea deal on one condition. I then discussed the ability to put a wire on the witness, it struck me that if Claude Taylor was willing to wear a wire, we may be able to get Ray Berry to talk about what happened and get him admissions, so to speak, that Ray Berry did indeed kill Chris Green. It was the evidence that we were looking for. Claude was apprehensive, but he knew what was on the line here.

He needed to cooperate. I made that clear to him that it needed to feel natural. Anytime you have somebody who is wearing a liar, they can't just jump right into the part of the conversation that's incriminating. Claude came up with the idea to fabricate a story that somebody was talking on the street about Ray Berry and Chris.

While dropping off Ray Berry, we heard Claude ask Ray, what did Chris say when you were beating him up? There was a moment of silence. I remember looking at my partner and saying, did he say what I think he said? We knew we had it. We got the admission that we were looking for. Ray Berry said, Chris Green said, don't kill me, man. That admission kind of sealed it up and really motivated us to want to move forward and get some closure for the family and for this case. Following the wiretap operation, Ray Berry is arrested for a parole violation on an earlier charge. That's when I went and interviewed Ray Berry.

We wanted to encourage him to be cooperative and confess ultimately. How you been? I'm by the scene right now. He was listed witness on another homicide case that we broke the ice with. Initially, he was very cooperative, even jovial. You're living out there on 60th Street.

He knows more about that case. I know what I'm know more about it, but we want to get my case. And then we kind of transitioned to the Chris Green homicide. Next case we're talking about. The next case? Yeah, the next case.

We mentioned a couple of cases. It was Chris Doreen. He was killed on and on your street. Remember that case? Oh, that case. You could see the switch being flipped. We're talking to everybody. Yeah.

And that's why we came here today? Y'all seen a cool person, and why? Why? Y'all keep questioning me, questioning me, questioning me? Because we never questioned you. Those other detectives talked to you? Yeah, we've never spoke with you, Ray. I told them they checked it.

I'm done answering questions. Next time it's going to go to board. I want a board, you know what I'm saying? It was a short conversation. It is frustrating to some degree, but I was confident that we had enough to move forward with this case. Once we had enough to get a warrant on Ray Berry for the murder of Chris Green, he told the Greens we are ready to make

an arrest. They burst out in tears. I'm just sitting there like my mind is blown. A whole bunch of emotions were flooding at me. It was like relief and frustration and, you know, happiness and anger. I did hear that Ray really liked Lisa. And there may have been some jealousy that Christopher was dating Lisa. My mind couldn't even wrap itself around that thought that that could be the potential motive.

Ray Berry is charged with first-degree murder. He pleads not guilty and the case goes to trial. We knew as we got ready to take this case in front of a jury that we had challenges. It was primarily a circumstantial case. There were no eyewitnesses to the crime. There was no DNA or fingerprints found on scene. There was a sense of relief that we're getting closer. There could be an end to this, finally. But is there enough evidence really here?

Is justice going to be served on what we've got? It's now January 2014, 11 years after Christopher Green's murder. The case that we presented at trial was that Christopher Green was walking home on 60th Street when he was ambushed by Ray Berry. Ray had seen Christopher walking outside of his window when the attack happened. And we came to the conclusion based upon witness statements that there was this jealousy that he had towards Christopher

because of Christopher's interactions with Lisa Cousins and this sort of boiling romantic rivalry eventually led him to explode and kill Christopher Green. The key pieces of evidence that we had were first of all the shoes linking Ray Berry to the crime scene. There was also statements that Ray had made to other people throughout the years that indicated his involvement in the homicide. The jury found Ray Berry guilty of premeditated first-degree murder. It was like this huge relief just raised off of my shoulders. And I was like, I don't have to carry this pain around anymore. We're not still sitting here wondering what happened.

Investigators, they never forgot about Christopher Green. He deserved Ray Berry to be arrested. His family deserved to see that man locked up. We were happy that we were able to bring justice to Christopher. I would say to the family, I wish we could have done it sooner, and thank you for being patient with us. The judge gave him life without the possibility of parole. So when Ray was sentenced, he had no emotion.

I wanted to know, why would you do something of this magnitude? Do you understand the pain that that brings to a family? My father had passed before we went to trial. He didn't get to see that justice. For my mom, she's still trying to figure out how to process this. I definitely sit there and reflect quite often about what would life be like if Christopher was here. What would life be like if Christopher was here? My son was born two years after Christopher had passed. I wanted to give him the middle name of Christopher because I felt that was the way

that I could honor my brother. I wonder where he would be now, how he would be as an uncle to my two children. Would they go camping like we used to do? Would he come over and do fun uncle things with the both of them? My brother would have wanted to be there for all of that. At Pluto TV, we're celebrating Black History Month with our curated collection of Black content all streaming for free.

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