Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - SPECIAL WEEKEND CRIME STORIES UPDATE: Hubby's 'PROS & CONS' LIST TO 'KEEP' PREGNANT WIFE Found After She is Found Dead

Episode Date: September 17, 2022

A jury find Missouri husband Beau Rothwell guilty of killing his pregnant wife missing. Jennifer Rothwell's  car is found abandoned just a mile from home. Beau Rothwell tells police he last saw Jennifer Rothwell, 28, that morning as she left for work.  Days later, Jennifer Rothwell's body is found in a wooded area along Highway 61 near Troy. An autopsy stated that she suffered blunt force trauma to the head. The day after Jennifer Rothwell went missing, Beau Rothwell is arrested.  Police believe he killed his wife — who was six weeks pregnant — sometime on November 11.  Search warrants alleged that Jennifer Rothwell used the internet to search, “What to do if your husband is upset you are pregnant.” The same documents also stated that Beau Rothwell cleaned up some blood and left a small window to the garage open, despite freezing temperatures, to “dissipate the odor.”  Beau Rothwell reportedly told authorities where his pregnant wife’s remains were located. Turns out Beau Rothwell was having an affair and made a pro/con list on whether to stay in the marriage.   Joining Nancy Grace Today: Matthew Mangino - Criminal Defense Attorney (New Castle, PA), Former District Attorney (Lawrence County), Former Parole Board Member, Author: "The Executioner's Toll", Twitter: @MatthewTMangino, MattMangino.com Dr. Bethany Marshall - Psychoanalyst (Beverly Hills, CA), DrBethanyMarshall.com, New Netflix show: 'Bling Empire' (Beverly Hills) Dr. Tim Gallagher - Medical Examiner State of Florida PathcareMed.com, Lecturer: University of Florida Medical School Forensic Medicine, Founder/Host: International Forensic Medicine Death Investigation Conference John Guard - Chief Deputy – Pitt County Sheriff’s Office (Greenville, NC), Specializes in Investigating Domestic Violence Cases Kristy Mazurek - Emmy Award-winning Investigative Reporter, President: "Successful Strategies"  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I want you to just let this sink in. Let's say it's a Google search. Okay. And here we go. Quote, what to do if husband is upset you're pregnant. Repeat. What to do if husband is upset you're pregnant. That was the final internet search of Jennifer Rothwell before she was bludgeoned dead.

I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM. What to do if your husband's upset you're pregnant? Well, for one thing, get a new husband or just get rid of that one. You don't necessarily need a new one. I'm just thinking about this woman, Jennifer Rothwell.

She's just 28 years old. Oh, gosh. Her naked body was dumped in the woods off Highway 61 in Missouri. Then hubby, I don't even want to say his name, but I will for you, Bo Rothwell, reports her missing. Sends concerned text to her cell phone. And then has the utter gall to go out and pretend he's searching for her. Ugh. Well, the jury has handed down a verdict.

In the case against Bo Rothwell, age 31, being tried for the murder of his pregnant wife, Jennifer. How did the whole thing start? Beau and Jennifer's romance begins while they are both studying engineering at the University of Missouri-Columbia. In 2015, they say I do and move to St. Louis

for work. Jennifer Rothwell is a chemical engineer at MECS Inc. in Chesterfield. Beau Rothwell works at Ambitech, now called Zachary Engineering in the St. Louis area. Soon, the couple turns their eyes on becoming parents, and just one year later, they get the good news. A baby is on the way. It sounds like a dream come true, and it is. It's what everyone wants, the American dream. A beautiful home, a lovely family, a baby finally on the way, awesome careers in front of

them. And then somehow in the midst of all this happiness, she disappears. Her family, her parents, her husband, devastated. Take a listen to Robert Townsend, KSDK. I talked to Jennifer Rothwell's parents on the phone. Now, they didn't want to go on camera. Their big concern is just hearing from their daughter. I'm going to step back and you can see right now, St. Louis County Police, they are here sitting in two vehicles on Rothwell Street. They blocked off this street. Officers are going in and outside this house. We believe that they are searching in and out of this house. Again, the family's house here off Northwinds Drive in West St. Louis County,

searching for possible evidence, I believe, in connection with this woman's disappearance. Again, this is what I know. Jennifer Rothwell is 28 years old and married. She's 5'6 tall. She has long, light brown hair, curly hair. She weighs about 150 pounds. Now, she was last seen leaving her West St. Louis County house yesterday morning. And six weeks pregnant.

With me, an all-star panel. But let me first go to Christy Missouri, joining us, Emmy Award-winning investigative reporter. Christy, thank you for being with us. Now, this took place in Creve Coeur, Missouri. Tell me about that. It's a lovely, family-oriented community. Neighbors know everybody else. So for this woman to just vanish in thin air without a trace was very unnerving to her neighbors.

So is it apartments? Are they single-dwelling homes? Oh, they're homes. Yeah, it's a lovely little suburbia. It's utopia. What were their jobs, Christy Mazur? Where did they work? They were engineers. So these are learned people making very good salaries, upper level income. So these are meticulous people. That's why when she went missing, it was so out of the ordinary because both of these people separately and as a couple had every moment of their day documented with a calendar. Oh, my goodness. To Dr. Bethany Marshall joining me, high profile psychoanalyst.

Find her at drbethanymarshall.com. Dr. Bethany, the reason I'm asking about the area is the first thing you want to do is look at the area if it has a high crime rate. Have there been a string of break-ins? I don't know if you remember. Jackie, look this up for me. I recently covered a pastor's wife who was pregnant, who was the victim of a home invasion. And her other baby was home. At the time, I think it was like a two-year-old son was home. And, of course, all the suspicion went on the pastor, the young pastor at first because he had been at the gym. So it led to suspicion on the pastor.

And the next thing you know, it came out that there had been several burglaries in the neighborhood. Did you find it, Jack? Amanda Blackburn in Indianapolis. That's right. Amanda Blackburn. Now I remember exactly. Amanda Blackburn, just beautiful. I can see her face right in front of me.

And everyone was questioning the pastor because of his early morning gym trip. It turned out to be this group of burglars and they wouldn't even get very much. They'd get like a tv or a dvd player they broke into her home and i think the door was unlocked bethany as i recall and murdered her so she wouldn't be a witness awful so that's why i'm saying what kind of an area is it high crime low crime but i also find it interesting what christy mazurk said that these two i'm talking about jennifer and husband beau they're they're about to have their baby young and love the whole thing they're so meticulous it's very rare

that you see in a low crime area, someone just go missing. Now, if she left the area on her way to work or on her way to the grocery store, that changes the whole scenario. But you don't see a lot of people just vanish when they're the kind of person that has day and date, you know, every hour accounted for. Nancy, this is a beautiful young woman, a high level

professional. She is an engineer. She works in a business or in a company with many other people. And one of the first things I would wonder is had somebody fallen in love with her? Was somebody obsessed with her? Did she have a stalker? Somebody who is making advances to her or wanting to spend time with her I think that's the first thing I would look at who are her friendships what's going on in her computer who did she spend time with the second thing is this she's right Matt what do you think she's going out to bars in all weeks six weeks that's still pregnant she's not she's not showing you know I threw up every single day of my pregnancy starting at about 1.30.

Every day. I have news for you, Nancy. Some guy who's stalking her, who has a crush on her, is not going to care that she's throwing up every day. Okay, thank you for that visual. But you know what you said? You said something really interesting. Let me throw this to Matthew Mangino joining us. High-profile criminal defense attorney out of Newcastle, Pennsylvania, former district attorney in Lawrence County. And

the reason I emphasize that is you cannot be the district attorney or an assistant district attorney without trying a lot of cases. He knows his way around the courtroom, author of The Executioner's Toll. You can find him at mattmangino.com. Matthew, when she said, when Dr. Bethany said, they're highly trained, highly learned engineers. That is a very exact science. And Bethany also said she works with a lot of people, which is true for engineers. In my mind, I thought she works with a lot of men. That's true. That's a male-dominated occupation. And when you work with a lot of men, that heightens the likelihood that one of them is going to get a crush on you. Well, yeah, that's certainly a possibility. And that's something that I'm sure

the police would consider immediately upon learning of her disappearance. Obviously, we know from news accounts that they're searching the home, which is the first place that they're going to look when someone comes up missing. As you mentioned earlier, the preacher, you know, unfortunately, they're going to look to people who have close contact with her. They're going to look to the husband immediately just to make sure that there's some basis for not looking further at him. They want to eliminate the husband first of all. You know, but they're looking in the home.

So we know that there might be some information there that they're interested in. And I think that's where they're going to find out her every move. These two have been married for four years and she's last seen alive that morning leaving for her job as a chemical engineer. Straight out to John Gard joining us, chief deputy with Pitt County Sheriff's Office in Greenville, who specializes in cases just like this one. You know, Jennifer Rothwell, it strikes me how organized she was. So it should have been easy for police to figure out where she would have been at the time she went missing, John Garb, because isn't all of that saved in the cloud?

Absolutely, Nancy. And that's one of the first things, you know, we're going to do in any case that begins maybe as a missing person. You're going to examine that digital footprint. And, you know, there's a lot of legs that go off that footprint, connect to other people and other information. And you're just going to run that information down and see where it takes you. Sounds like the police did what we normally do in cases like that and did a really, really good job learning a lot in hindsight, as I'm sure the investigators worked in the case and saw, you know, firsthand. But there was a lot of planning, not only, you know, in her daily life and what Jennifer did. She certainly lived by a calendar.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Well, the jury got it right. crime stories with nancy grace well the jury got it right beau rothwell 31 convicted in the murder of his gorgeous young wife pregnant 28 year old jennifer rothwell now he says he was in a, quote, red haze of anger. What? Is that supposed to make me think it's less than a murder? Because you claimed you were, quote, angry? Oh, I get angry every day. But I don't want to murder my husband. I love him.

And he absolutely puts up with me. The last thing that happens to me when I'm mad at David is for me to go into a, quote, red haze of anger. No. I'm looking at Jennifer Rothwell's picture right now, and I'm just imagining her and what she lived through when she was bludgeoned dead with a mallet. This was not a person that is prone to high risk behavior. She's not out on the corner hooking. She's not going into bad areas trying to score a rock, a crack. She's not into any nefarious activity. She has a very regular schedule and she's six weeks pregnant. Long story short, the fact that this woman just drops off the map, it's very, very uncommon.

Take a listen to our friends at CrimeOnline.com. Jennifer Rothwell was last seen leaving her West St. Louis County home. Bo Rothwell says Jennifer left for work at 620 that morning. As Bo Rothwell begins getting ready for his own day, Jennifer Rothwell calls four times, but Bo misses the calls. Rothwell texts his wife during the day, but there's no replies. Rothwell reports Jennifer as missing. I mean, the car, as I recall, was a Hyundai Sonata, right, Christy Mazurik? Correct, and a pretty common car. So I'm just wondering if they had nav in that car, navigational tracking, which I love. John Gard, Chief Deputy, Pitt County Sheriff's Office,

nav systems in cars, they're a huge benefit to police. But when you get somebody that may have a used car or an older car, no good. And this one is a 2011 Hyundai Sonata. Yeah, I'm thinking that's a little older and would not come with the GPS. And I have full time. So the only thing I can think of right now, if they're really trying to piece together where her car went, is the case of missing Connecticut mom of five, Jennifer Dulos. Her husband, there's no doubt in my mind, Fotis Dulos, was having an affair with the girlfriend, Michelle Traconis. And I have no doubt in my mind that he murdered her. She's not missing.

She's dead. Ring doorbell, every business, every resident surveillance video, red light cam, stop cam, bridge cam, toll cam, everything. They even got a camera. This is amazing. When a public bus opened its doors, the camera caught the husband going by in the vehicle. Then he, of course, takes the murder car to the car wash to have the car detailed, even changing out the back seats. Didn't really help because his wife's blood and hair was found on the seats. Long story short, we can work wonders with surveillance video, but not with the nav system in this car. But speaking of the car, suddenly we get a break in the case in the search for Jennifer Rothwell. Take a listen to our friends at Crime Online. Jennifer Rothwell's car is found the same day she is reported missing,

a little over a mile from her home. Around 930, the 2011 Hyundai Sonata is found on the side of a busy intersection. It did not appear to have been in a crash and was otherwise drivable, so the police tagged the vehicle as abandoned. After the owner was identified, Jennifer's phone was found inside. Okay, she didn't make it very far, did she? Just about a mile from her home. About 930 a.m., her sonata is found on the side of a busy intersection. It had not been in a crash.

It was not on empty. It did not have a flat tire. What does that mean? Let me go out to you, Matthew Mangino. Was she forced off the road? There's not a mark on her car. Why did she pull over? Did she suddenly get sick? Was she nauseous from being pregnant? I mean, what is that telling At first, you're thinking about a person who is missing. Maybe there's some reason she went someplace, and you're trying to figure that out as quickly as you can. But now you find her car alongside the road. That changes the dynamics of this investigation.

Now it appears that something sinister may have happened here. And again, this is where I think you begin to grab videotape that you can from neighboring businesses. You said it was a busy intersection. You start looking at all those possibilities of gaining additional information. But I think that finding this car a mile away without any damage or it's not incapacitated in some way. But it does point to something nefarious. Very nefarious. Nancy, do you remember that case? I was just going to go to you.

Go ahead, Dr. Bethany. Remember the case we covered years ago where there was a college student coming home late at night from a party at her college and the car was found on the side of the road, and they found some kind of surveillance, yes, that a group of boys had forced her off the road just before she was going over a bridge, and that was the only clue they had. I mean, I'm not saying that's the same in this case,

but when a single woman's car is found on the side of the road, I sometimes wonder, I mean, have you ever had somebody scary follow you in your car? I have a number of times in mind, and it's very frightening. You try to find the nearest police station, you try to fumble for your cell phone. But I would wonder, you know, if there's any surveillance, any footage that shows that there was somebody who tried to force her off the road. Well, this is also another interesting fact about a car being found, not flat, not empty, not banged up, no crash. It was also at a busy intersection. So you would think if someone was going to kidnap her, steal her away or force her in or out of the car, it would have been spotted.

But we have no witness. I know it was early in the morning, but people are up and about on the interstate, heading to airports, heading to work like she was at six o'clock in the morning. What can we learn from this car? Take a listen to Robert Townsend, KSDK. Creve Coeur police located a car not far from this house the same day near the intersection of Olive and Fifi Road. Flyers of the missing woman are posted right now inside several businesses in this very neighborhood. Police also tell us Rothwell's family and friends usually talk to her every day.

But again, they have not heard from this woman since Jennifer left home early yesterday morning. And that's why they filed a missing persons report. Police say Rothwell's husband, all of her relatives and family members, they spent the day talking to them. They just want to know where this woman is. Again, police tell us this young lady has never disappeared before. Back here live again, you see a very active scene in this neighborhood. St. Louis County Police right here sitting in two vehicles they are also asking anyone who sees jennifer rothwell to call st louis county police immediately as the search intensifies of course focus turns to the husband

but he beau rothwell is the one that called 9-1-. And so often when husbands are suspected in a wife's disappearance or even murder, they're not the ones that call 911. I mean, look at Barry Morphew. He didn't call 911. He called his daughters to call a neighbor. And I think the neighbor is the one that called 911. It goes on and on. As I recall in Scott Peterson, her parents called 9-1-1, not him. Let me understand this.

Christy Mazurik joining us. She's last seen at 630 a.m. And he, the husband, does call 9-1-1. But isn't it at nearly 10 o'clock at night when he calls 911? Correct, when she doesn't return from work. Now, mind you, flashback to what he said earlier in the day, she leaves for work, he misses a few phone calls from the morning, he waits until 10 p.m. to finally say something's wrong here. I haven't heard from my wife in over 12 hours. Well, another thing I don't think that she normally gets home at 10 o'clock at night for sure, because if she's going in at

630, especially in light of her being pregnant, he waited until nearly 10 o'clock at night. That still is not damning. But it was enough for her family to be concerned because she spoke to them on a daily basis. So when dinner time rolled around that day and they hadn't heard from Jennifer, when they questioned Bo, he said, well, I tried calling her this morning. She hasn't answered her phone.

That started putting up some concerns. When you hit a wall, I always start over again. Matthew Mangino, a high-profile lawyer out of Newcastle, former district attorney, once you follow all your leads and you're going nowhere, You start all over again with the scenario, with the witnesses, with the ring cams, with the nav system, with the phone calls, with the texts. And, of course, you look at the husband. But I would look not only at the morning she was last seen. I would look at the days leading up to that. Would you? Well, yeah, there's no question about that.

I think you're exactly right. Once you've gone through what appear to be the obvious options here, you go back to the beginning. In the beginning, in investigations like this is looking at the husband. And you want to now get more information about the husband. You want to find out what he was doing in the days leading up to her disappearance. Exactly. And you're right. You want to see his phone. You want to see who he's been in contact with, who he's been talking to, who he's been messaging. And so this investigation in this short period of time has gone full circle. Let's go back to the beginning and let's be more thorough about what transpired prior to her disappearance. Then we find out that he is quite the neat neck.

That's always a concern to me when your wife goes missing and suddenly you're out buying bleach. Take a listen to our cut eight, our friends at Fox 2. Bo Rothwell told officers he last saw his wife at 6.20 a.m. at their home when she reportedly left for work. Minutes later, he missed four phone calls from her. Police found the victim's phone in her car abandoned on the side of the road near Olive and Fifi. Meanwhile, investigators noted Bo's pickup at their home about a mile away had a strong odor of bleach that seeped from the truck bed. A small window to the garage was open despite the cold temperatures. Dr. Tim Gallagher, renowned medical examiner for the entire state of Florida. You can find them at PathCareMed.com, a lecturer, University of Florida School of Medicine, and founder host of the International Forensic Medicine Death Investigation Conference.

Dr. Gallagher, why bleach? I mean, it's almost cliche where you see the killer in line at Walmart buying bleach. These cops get six feet from the husband's truck and they smell bleach. What is in bleach that hurts your nose? Well, bleach actually is chlorine bleach and chlorine is a gas. It's a very reactive gas and that it'll react with proteins. It'll react with bodily fluids and it'll react with proteins, it'll react with bodily fluids, and it'll react with tissue, you know, that's present in your nose. And when it does come in contact, it will ignite the nerve endings and it will radiate pain from your nose all up through your face. So another thing I wanted to point out now that I got a chance, again, is to say places like Walmart, Target, you know, their surveillance system.

You know, we kind of frown upon these large big box stores, but we've caught a lot of criminals using the surveillance and photography system present, you know, at the registers at Walmart and places like Target. Who frowns on big box stores? Little box stores. Ah, you're right because I don't. I'm telling you. So did you say chlorine is what's in bleach that hurts your nose? Right. Chlorine is a gas that is dissolved in a fluid, which is then called bleach.

But it evaporates very quickly out of the fluid and it goes into your nose, reacts with the tissue and ignites the nerve endings. That's what causes the pain. You know, a lot of people think that bleach alone can get rid of DNA. That's absolutely not true. You need something like muriatic acid, like black swan, if you really want to do the job right. But I mean, you can smell bleach a mile away. Hey, that just made me think of something,

Dr. Tim Gallagher. Remember in the Morphew case where everybody went into his hotel room and said it smelled like chlorine? Would that have been possibly bleach and not chlorine from a swimming pool? Most likely, if you just smell it in one room and not all of the rooms, most likely it is bleach that is centralized in that one location. You do know I could listen to you talk all day long, but getting back on track. So we've got the husband cleaning out his truck bed with bleach, and he's even opened the garage window, left it cracked open. What? To dissipate the odor? Odor of what? But then we find out about a list. You know, Dr. Bethany Marshall, there's such thing as being too organized.

Take a listen to our cut nine, our friends at Fox 2. Bo Rothwell's list of pros and cons about his mistress. Rothwell wrote it on a work notebook dated five months before the murder. Pluses indicating the pros like better sex life, more respect, fresh start. Then he wrote, is the cost too high? Under cons indicated by a minus sign, half my assets, money, trust is shaken, tainted. My family disappointment and take on her kid with his probs. The list did not mention killing anyone. Wow, Chrissy Mazurek, a list made out of

pros and cons, whether he should keep the wife or get rid of her. Do you remember those old Geritol commercials that would run during Lawrence Welk where the husband at the end would say, I think I'll keep her. Even as a little girl, that just rubbed me the wrong way, but I didn't know why. He made a list of pros and cons about keeping his wife or what? Trading him? Yeah, marriage or mistress. That was his dilemma. Can we talk about the mistress? What did you just say? Go ahead.

I'm listening. Marriage or mistress. Because that list really puts investigators on the trajectory looking further into his phone, who he was talking to, how long he was talking to them, and what exactly he was saying. And then they uncover this whole sordid affair he was having with another woman and some very eye-opening text messages to this woman just before Jennifer goes missing. Okay, wait, tell me about the text messages. Well, as we were saying, he was debating marriage or mistress. He claims he was feeling guilty about having this affair and wanted to come clean to his wife. So he and his mistress start texting back and forth and he said, well, we have three options. Option one is to end things altogether and stop chatting. Option two, I'll admit the affair to Jennifer and get a divorce. Option three, because now Jennifer's pregnant and he knows this, see if a miscarriage or quote, something happens, in which case Bo would leave Jennifer for her. And it's that comment or something happens that police focus on. So now we learn not only did he make a pro and con list.

To Dr. Bethany Marshall very quickly, I would hate to think that you could reduce a marriage and a pregnancy down to a pros and cons list. Marriage or mistress, you know what's missing out of this list is his emotions towards either one of these two women. There's nothing about his wife being beautiful. What about the unborn child? The unborn child is not really mentioned.

His family, anything emotional about the people in his life, he does mention loss of respect, but that's very self-referential and it just has all to do with him. There's nothing about loving or being attached to anybody else but himself. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Well, the jury has handed down a verdict in the case against Bo Rothwell, age 31, being tried for the murder of his pregnant wife, Jennifer. What do we know about the night Jennifer Rothwell was murdered? What medical examiners and crime reconstructionists think

happened is that he, the husband, bashed her in the back of the head with a mallet that sent her stumbling down. And he then followed her as she tried to crawl away, get away from him, all this pregnant, I might add, and continued to beat her she was unconscious and he continued to beat her then he started a haphazard cover-up of the murder buying cleaning supplies tried to bleach his dead wife's blood from the house drove her car to an intersection and abandoned it there tossed a blood-stained tarp and the cleaning supplies away together in a dumpster. He claims he went into, quote, panic mode. That's what he said to the jury.

Her naked body was dumped in the woods off Highway 61 in Missouri. Take a listen to our friends at KSDK. St. Louis County Police tells me that today they went back to the area that they were last night, hoping that the daylight can help them find any new sort of evidence. St. Louis County Police Chief John Belmar says the rain made it even harder to search. This major operation was off the roadway of US 61, just north of KK. But after six hours of looking, they found the body of a white adult female at 1115 last night along US 61 near Quiver River State Park. Facebook messages between the husband and his girlfriend show he was very upset when he discovered she was pregnant. Take a listen to

our prints at KMOV. Rothwell said, I had mixed feelings. I wanted to be a dad a long time, but I was having an affair. He said he felt guilty about the affair. And on November 11th, Rothwell said, my plan was to tell her about the affair, throw myself on her mercy and hope for the best. Rothwell said he and Jennifer were sitting in the kitchen of their home when he confessed his affair and gave this account of their exchange. I'm really sorry, but I'm having an affair. How dare you, expletive.

He claims she shoved him and then said, keep your mystery, expletive. I've got someone too. Is this even mine? It doesn't mind. The baby's probably not yours. Who is it? It doesn't matter.

At least he can get me pregnant. Okay, that sounds like a lot of BS to me. Well, once this guy starts talking, he really lets it rip. Take a listen to our cut 12, our friends at KMOV. Rothwell says he was standing behind Jennifer and hit her on the right temple with a mallet, then followed her as she stumbled toward the garage. In the heat of the moment, I hit her again.

I think I cracked her skull and she fell down the stairs. He said she was unresponsive. I couldn't tell if she was deceased. But instead of calling 911 for an ambulance, Rothwell said he went into panic mode and started cleaning up. Every fiber in my body was saying, do something or I die. After killing Jennifer, I thought I had to clean this up and hide what I'd done. He said after cleaning up the blood, he loaded her body in the back of his pickup and drove without knowing where he was going. Eventually pulled off the side of the road on Highway 61 near Troy

and put her body 20 to 25 feet off the road and covered it with twigs and leaves. And that's not all. He just can't stop talking. Take a listen to our cut 13. He admitted parking her car along Olive Boulevard as part of a scheme to claim she'd gone missing and said he knew it was wrong to deceive her friends,

but felt like he had to keep up the facade so get this on cross-examination bro wathwell admitted that he was still in almost daily contact with the woman he was having an affair with in fact multiple times a day i spoke with an alternate juror who the judge said was no longer needed and allowed to go home she said if she was in the jury room she would vote for guilty of first degree murder. In fact, she said, quote, he's guilty as hell. And listen to what we now learn he did to his pregnant wife's body, then making up this lie about the baby belonging to another man. Take a listen to Our Cut 14 KMOV. The Facebook messages between Bo Rothwell and his girlfriend showed that he was very upset when he found out that his wife was pregnant. This afternoon, detectives presented evidence that there had been a bloody, violent confrontation in the basement of the couple's home. Prosecutors have said that 28-year-old Jennifer Rothwell's skull was crushed.

Her body found dumped along Highway 61 near Troy. Her clothes had been removed. She was bound with duct tape and had a plastic bag over her head. In testimony this afternoon, the lead detective testified about conducting a search at the couple's home. He said there was no sign of forced entry into the home and that in the basement, detectives found reddish circle staining in the carpet and indentions in the wall.

During the search of the home, detectives removed basement carpet and carpet padding and showed the stained items to the jury today. It just breaks my heart that this woman, this poor woman, Jennifer Rothwell, expecting her first child, was online looking at a website forum called Husband Doesn't Care, First Pregnancy Forums, What to Expect. It's just she was all alone in the world. Her husband texting and sleeping with another woman even after she goes missing. In other words, he killed her. He's still carrying on the relationship with the mistress. And I noticed when he speaks to detectives, he refers to the body. I mean, Dr. Tim Gallagher, that was a lot of staging he did postmortem, stripping her nude after he beat her dead in the head, zip tying her wrists, putting a plastic bag over her head, hiding her body's a lot of staging Dr. Gallagher. Well it is and it's kind of easy to see why he did wrap the head as we had in other cases before

when there is a head injury a severe open skull fracture it bleeds very heavily we know that the heart keeps pumping the blood through the wound and it creates a lot of bleeding, more so than you would ever expect. Maybe he was trying to hide that evidence and prevent her from continuing to bleed as he transports her. Well, the alternate juror was right on. Take a listen to our cut 16, our friends at KMOV. The jury took only three hours and 20 minutes to reach their verdict tonight, and when they read it out loud, the courtroom erupted with emotion. Jennifer Rothwell's friends and family say they feel a sense of relief and justice. It's a conviction the state was confident Bo Rothwell would receive. One of the things that came out in testimony was the defendant said with the second hit that he thought she was trying to stop her from getting away. And right there you have deliberation.

During Bo's testimony early Thursday, he said, haunted me every day since. Bo Rothwell was charged with first-degree murder, tampering with evidence for trying to clean up the crime scene, and abandoning Jennifer's body near Troy, Missouri. Then around 6.30 Thursday, Rothwell was found guilty on all counts, hanging his head in dismay. But throughout the rest of the courtroom, a sense of relief and justice flooded Jennifer's friends and family. They will live forever without her. No prison term will be enough of a punishment for this husband, so cold, so callous. Take a listen to our friends at Fox 2. Rothwell showed no emotions as the judge read the sentence, life without parole. Besides life in prison for first-degree murder charge, Rothwell got four years in prison for tampering with physical evidence

and four years for abandonment of a corpse. Before his sentence, Rothwell told the court and Jennifer's family and friends, words can't begin to describe how horrible this was and I'm sorry about what happened. At the hearing, Jennifer's mother appeared on video saying she will never have a chance to hold her child in her arms. And Jennifer will never know the joy of taking her daughter to trick-or-treating and matching costumes. Investigators say the victim's family finally got the justice they deserve. Well, Bo Rothwell's getting life behind bars.

Let that be just a short pit stop on his way to hell. I'm Nancy Grace, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.