Dark Downeast - The Murder of Susan Randall (New Hampshire)

Episode Date: June 28, 2021

NEW HAMPSHIRE MURDER, 1971: DNA evidence is one of the most critical developments in the history of criminal investigations ever. Cold cases from the pre-DNA era are reviewed with new testing and analysis in the hopes that the advanced science will reveal new information in a long-standing unsolved murder.But that’s not the only way DNA evidence is used in criminal cases. According to the Innocence Project, new DNA evidence and testing has exonerated 192 individuals wrongly convicted of crimes that DNA proved they didn’t commit. Could this be the case of Susan Randall and the man convicted of her murder?Not so fast. I want you to hear the whole story -- Susan Randall’s story. View source material and photos for this episode at darkdowneast.com/susanrandallFollow @darkdowneast on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTokTo suggest a case visit darkdowneast.com/submit-caseDark Downeast is an audiochuck and Kylie Media production hosted by Kylie Low.

DNA evidence. It's one of the most critical developments in the history of criminal investigations ever. Cold cases from the pre-DNA era are reviewed with new technology, new testing, new analysis in the hopes that this newly developed science will bring new information in a long-standing unsolved murder. But that's not the only way DNA evidence is used in criminal cases. According to the Innocence Project, new DNA evidence and testing has exonerated 192 individuals wrongly convicted of crimes that DNA proved they didn't commit. Could this be the case of Susan Randall and the man convicted of her murder? Not so fast. I want you to hear the whole story. Susan Randall's story. I'm Kylie Lowe, and this is Dark Down East. She'd just graduated high school, West High School, class of 1970.

18-year-old Susan Randall worked two jobs, one of them at the Holiday Inn in Manchester, New Hampshire, where she lived. And she was squirreling away the money she earned to pay for her fall semester at Chamberlain School of Design in Boston. She dreamed of becoming a fashion designer. And with her dedication and eye for design, she was equipped to make it happen. It was Saturday, February 27th, 1971. Susan Randall had the night off, likely a rare occasion for someone working two jobs. Her friend Judy Jenkins invited her over to hang out at her new apartment. And so Susie picked the perfect outfit for a frigid New England winter night. Blue jeans, a chunky sweater, a hip-length brown fur coat, and a brown floppy

hat that perfectly accented her long dark hair. As an aspiring fashion designer, Susie's outfits were always impeccable. With one last check of her ensemble in the mirror, she flipped off the lights and stepped out into the night. Judy lived on Manchester Street in Manchester, one of the perfectly gridded streets between the District B and Hanover Hill neighborhoods of Manchester's downtown. Susan arrived at Judy's place around 9.30, and they hung out for a while. Judy gave Susie a grand tour of her apartment, and they caught up on life since high school. After a few hours, the pair got hungry, and so they ventured off in search of a late-night pizza fix. It would have been around 11 1130 when the two girls polished

off their slices and decided to call it a night. Judy and Susan left the pizza parlor together, walking down Elm Street towards Granite Street and into Granite Square. Judy's dad was coming to pick her up for a ride home, and he told her to meet up front of the Squog Fruit Store at 48 South Main Street. As Judy's father pulled up in front of the store, Judy gave Susan a hug goodbye. Susan planned to hitch a ride home on her own. Her mother always warned her that hitchhiking wasn't safe, but this was New Hampshire. It was her hometown. There's a sense of security that comes with living in your same hometown for so long. And besides, it was 1971.

Hitchhiking was way more common and accepted. It was after midnight by then, approaching the earliest hours of Sunday, February 28th. Susan walked around the corner beyond the fruit store and stood in the pooling light from the Chicken House restaurant, thumbing for a ride back over the bridge to the neighborhoods east of the Merrimack River. Though spring was technically only a few weeks away, New England weather doesn't show signs of it until much later. She pulled her fur coat tightly around her body, a few weeks away, New England weather doesn't show signs of it until much later. She pulled her fur coat tightly around her body, keeping warm against the frozen air.

Susan didn't have to wait long to escape the chill of that early February morning. A passing car slowed and then stopped. Diners at the Chicken House restaurant watched through the frosted glass windows as a girl with dark hair, wearing a floppy hat and a fur coat, opened the door of a white car and slid onto the blue upholstered seats next to the driver. The driver, from what they could tell, was a tall, broad-shouldered man with a noticeably large head. The chicken house patron returned to their meal, an unwitting witness to the beginning of a tragic night. Mr. and Mrs. Lucier were driving through Manchester in the early morning hours of February 28th when they came upon a bizarre and startling scene. The defroster was working overtime on the car's windshield,

and at first, Mrs. Lucier wasn't certain that what she was seeing was really there. Standing in the shoulder of the road was a young woman, or maybe a girl. It seemed like maybe that girl was nude from the waist down, but she couldn't be sure. The girl's mouth was open and she flailed her arms, signaling to the car to pull over. Mr. Lucier saw a light-colored car parked on the side of the road. Maybe this young woman had broken down and needed help. He slowed down as he approached, but before he could fully stop at the scene, Mrs. Lucier waved him ahead. I don't want to stop, she told him. And so, they kept going.

Susan Randall never made it home that night. Her family wasted no time reporting their daughter and sister missing. On the afternoon of March 2, 1971, a state highway department worker slammed the door of his state-issued vehicle and surveyed the job site for the day. A bridge over the Merrimack River on Interstate Route 93, just north of Concord, was in need of repair. He retrieved his safety equipment and evaluated the extent of repair work needed, peering over either side of the heavily trafficked bridge, down at the frozen riverbanks below. That's when he saw her. Though she lay about 25 feet away from the bridge where he was standing, it was obvious the shape on the stark white surface of the ice

below was a body. She appeared to be nude from the waist down. Concord Police was the first agency on the scene, and officers hoisted the unidentified body in a rescue basket for transport to the Concord Hospital morgue. Though police were aware of the missing person report for a young woman named Susan Randall, identification wasn't immediately possible. This Jane Doe had endured a brutal beating before her death. The only indication of who this victim was included her fur coat, tossed like her body onto the banks of the Merrimack River. The mother of the victim later confirmed this was the body of her daughter, Susan Randall. I'm not going to list Susan's injuries. I'm not going to walk you through the details of her

autopsy report because I don't know what purpose that serves to share the line items of the brutality she faced before her death. But you should know this. Susan fought. Susan fought for her life. The medical examiner retained clippings of her fingernails as evidence, noting the dried blood underneath. Attorney General Warren Rudman spoke to the Nashua Telegraph and other media the day after Susan's body was recovered. He assured the public that his office would, quote, bring the maximum possible

force to bear on the solution of this crime, unquote. It had been just 24 hours into the investigation. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, this region of New Hampshire was no stranger to homicide investigations, and some of those cases were still active and unsolved at the time of Susan Randall's murder. The Attorney General's office and all of the law enforcement agencies likely felt the pressure of yet another stolen life from their small New Hampshire communities. And so they wasted no time in the search for Susan's killer. Later that afternoon on March 2nd, 1971, the day Susan Randall's body was recovered,

but before her identity was confirmed, a tall broad-shouldered man showed up at the Manchester Police Department. He told the officer on duty that he heard they found a body and he was there to speak with police. He stated he thought police might want to speak with him because he'd been, quote, questioned before on things, unquote. The officer took down his name, 35-year-old Robert Breast. Robert Breast was a carpenter, and he lived about 45 minutes away from Manchester in Lowell, Massachusetts, with his pregnant wife and son. On March 15, 1971, Colonel Paul Doyon of the New Hampshire

State Police met with Robert at his home. They wanted to know where he was on the evening of February 27 and the early morning hours of February 28th, 1971. Well, Robert told him, he was in Manchester, at his old apartment in Granite Square. Around 5.30 on the night of the 27th, Robert was in town picking up some of his furniture from his old place. He recruited the help of a few young guys to load the pieces of furniture into the back of his white 1964 Ford sedan. He'd removed the back seat to make way for the oversized cargo, and decided to leave that seat at the home of a neighbor, the Haggits. After loading up, Robert headed back to Lowell. Though he must have made a few stops along the way because

he didn't actually make it there until after 10.30pm. He once again needed help getting the furniture out of his car, so Robert asked his neighbor, Dolor Moral, to help empty it out. Then, Robert told Colonel Doyon, he was home for the night, never went back to Manchester. He stayed put. The officer asked Robert if he could take a peek at his car, the white Ford he was driving that night to move furniture. Robert agreed, and Doyon conducted a basic inspection. He noted that the interior upholstery was blue, and the back seat was in the vehicle, but he didn't see anything concerning.

As he shook Robert's hand and thanked him for his time, Doyon paused a bit longer than would be typical for a courteous handshake. Between Robert's knuckles were scratches. Noticeable scratches. What are those? He asked Robert. Robert blamed them on a cat. Apparently satisfied with the explanation, Doyon released his grip on Robert's hand and left. Of course, Robert's alibi needed verifying. A man who presents himself to police on the same day a body is discovered assuming detectives will want to speak to him is enough to raise an eyebrow, at the very least. Investigators had to establish a timeline of Breast's movements, starting with the witnesses who helped him load and unload the furniture into his car. That's where the first inconsistency in Brie's story was revealed. After Dolor helped Robert unload the furniture in Lowell,

Dolor told police that Robert had to return to Manchester for something. And so by 11pm, Robert was back in his car pulling away from his, and as Dolor assumed, heading back to Manchester. Someone else could place Robert back in Manchester that night, too. On March 1st, 1971, before Susan's body was discovered, and before Robert inserted himself into the equation, a woman named Jenny Haggett filed a report with Manchester police. A man named Robert showed up at her house in Granite Square around 11.45 p.m. on the night of February 27th. Jenny said this Robert disturbed her family

and she asked him to leave. From the documents I've reviewed, it seems Jenny didn't know Robert, but it's possible that her son, who also lived at her home, might have known of him. Because that was where he'd left the backseat of his car when he removed it to fit furniture inside. As Robert left, she told police, he grabbed something off her porch and put it into the back of his car. Jenny noted the time of his departure, 12.10 a.m. She described the man as over six feet tall and 200 pounds. The description matched the build of Robert Breast. The next morning, Robert's neighbor Dolor noticed Robert's white car back on the street.

The back seat was in place. With the concerning omissions in Robert's own timeline and statements of the night of February 27th and morning of February 28th, investigators wanted to take a closer look at the vehicle he was driving that evening. They'd learned from other witnesses at the Chicken House restaurant that a woman matching Susan Randall's description got into a white car with blue upholstery driven by a tall man. The car may have passed Colonel Doyon's initial inspection, but investigators knew microscopic evidence would reveal what the human eye can't see. On April 2, 1971, state police executed a search warrant for Robert Breast's white Ford sedan in search of fingerprints, blood, and trace evidence. They extracted fibers from the seats and paint chips from the door panels, carefully bagging and cataloging the pieces for further examination at the New Hampshire State Police Crime Laboratory.

Under Roger Bowden's powerful microscope, the paint chips and fibers revealed a convincing, but not altogether conclusive story. Bowden concluded with a high degree of probability that Susan Randall came in contact with the surfaces of Robert Breast's vehicle, based on comparison with microscopic paint chips found on and in her coat. Needing a second opinion for greater confidence in this conclusion, the samples were sent off to the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms for neutron activation analysis. ATF reached the same opinion. Susan Randall's coat was in that car. The timeline and location made sense. The circumstantial evidence aligned,

and the forensic chemical analysis of those particles from their suspect's car and the victim's coat gave police and the Attorney General's office confidence in their case. Because of the delay in the investigation caused by that advanced testing and chemical analysis, over a year had passed. Finally, on April 6, 1972, police arrested Robert Breast for the murder of 18-year-old Susan Randall. Robert Breast was living in Lowell, Massachusetts at the time of his arrest, and so he sat in jail held without bail as he awaited extradition to New Hampshire, which he contested. Ultimately, he was extradited, and he entered a plea of innocent to the charge of murder in the first degree. While held at the Merrimack County Jail, Robert Breast filed suit in U.S. District Court,

arguing that his rights had been violated. According to reporting by the Lowell Sun, the petition claimed that Robert was denied access to several magazines, specifically Playboy and Rogue. In the same complaint, he alleged that he was denied attendance to a Roman Catholic mass, that he wasn't assigned an adequate lawyer, and that they denied him appropriate visiting facilities. Meanwhile, the state continued to build their case against Robert Breast for the began in March of 1973. The state presented their case that Robert Breast, in the early morning hours of February 28, 1971, picked up Susan Randall in his car, and sometime after, a struggle ensued. Breast's comparatively large stature overpowered the young woman, and he inflicted critical injury

to her head and body. The drop from a bridge to the icy banks of the Merrimack River below proved to be the final fatal act. Witnesses would place Robert Breast in Manchester at the time of her death. Witnesses would place Susan Randall in the car that matched the description of Breast's vehicle with a man who looked an awful lot like Breast. Advanced chemical analysis would even put Susan's fur coat in Breast's car. They presented evidence that Robert's boot tested positive for the presence of blood, as did parts of his car. The state called Colonel Doyon to the stand, and he spoke about that first meeting with Robert, the scratches on his knuckles two weeks after Susan went missing. The state contended that Susan's fingernail clippings were

evidence that she clawed her assailant to the bone. But that wasn't the only proof the state had to convince the jury, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Robert Breast was Susan Randall's killer. They said that Robert Breast confessed to the murder to a jailhouse informant. Central to the state's case was testimony from a man named David Corita. He'd been incarcerated with Breast in Massachusetts before he was transferred to New Hampshire. According to court documents, Corita had the reputation of a jailhouse lawyer, and he agreed to help Robert while behind bars. Their cells were next to one another, and Breast confided his fears of extradition to Carita. From Carita, quote,

He told me if he was extradited to New Hampshire, he'd be convicted. He told me he'd just as soon wait two, three, or four years in the Billerica jail, unquote. When Corita asked Breast if he did it, if he killed Susan Randall, Corita testified that Breast responded, Corita also testified that he asked Robert Breast some clarifying questions. Did anyone see him do it? Was there any evidence that could tie him to Susan or the crime scene? Corita claimed that Breast told him no, no one saw him, but there was a key or set of keys that he left under a rock.

But Robert doubted the state would ever find that evidence. The informant also shared that Robert seemed proud of his collection of newspaper clippings, articles about Susan Randall that he'd cut from local publications. Jailhouse informants like David Corita are a controversial element of any criminal case. According to the Innocence Project, an organization who takes up cases of the wrongfully accused and convicted to review DNA evidence for possible exoneration, jailhouse informant testimony is largely unregulated. The testimony of these informants, who are often incentivized for their participation, is the leading contributing factor of wrongful convictions nationally, playing a role in nearly one in five

of the 367 DNA-based exoneration cases. Not to mention, this was David Corita's third time testifying in a murder trial. His testimony had played a role in 1968 and 1970 convictions of figures in Boston's organized crime. Though the defense aggressively cross-examined David Corita and attempted to discredit his version of events that included their client's apparent admission of guilt, they did not object to his testimony at any point. The defense did not file motion to strike the testimony at all. According to court documents filed later, quote, his testimony, like that of any other witness, was subject to whatever weight the jury

might choose to give it. We cannot say that his testimony was incredible as a matter of law, unquote. Meaning, the testimony was not in conflict with nature or fully established or conceded facts. The defense challenged the scientific analysis of the paint chips. They exhaustively cross-examined the state's witnesses and called the seven of their own witnesses to discredit the case against their client, including two witnesses who said they saw two dark-colored cars near the bridge where Susan's body was found on the morning she disappeared. Closing arguments began on March 22, 1973. The state concluded their case that Robert Breast was the killer who ended the life of 18-year-old Susan Randall. The jury, who had been sequestered since March 9th, were left to render their verdict.

Later that day, on March 22nd, 1973, the jury found Robert Breast guilty of murder in the first degree, also concluding that the murder had psychosexual elements. Based on that classification, Robert Breast was sentenced to life without possibility of parole. Susan's sister, Sally Randall Hembree, later told New Hampshire Public Radio, quote, She never had a life. She never had a chance for a life. She was 18 when she was murdered,

at the prime of her life. Unquote. As much as the Randall family was ready to move forward to allow for healing beyond the pain of their loss in the trial proceedings, Robert Breast wasn't done. His sentencing was just the beginning of what would become one of the most contentious legal battles in New Hampshire history. In 1976, Robert Breast filed eight appeals with the New Hampshire Supreme Court. court. According to reporting by the Portsmouth Herald, he contended that he didn't receive a fair trial, that evidence used against him had been improperly obtained, and that he was

improperly sentenced. The court denied all eight of the appeals, returning an 18-page unanimous decision that police procedure was appropriate, that evidence was obtained and presented appropriately, and that, quote, defendant did not object at the trial to these portions of the argument to which he is now complaining, which, if improper, could have been stopped or nullified by the court. He has thus waived any right to have his objections considered on appeal, unquote. Though the public wouldn't hear much out of Robert Breast until the year 2000, he did not stop in the pursuit of his own justice, justice he felt he was denied. His wife and children stood by his side throughout the decades of challenging his conviction and

sentence. In 1995, even though his sentence was life without parole, the state made Robert Breast an offer. Say he's guilty, admit guilt in the murder of Susan Randall, the crime for which he was convicted, and they'd give him parole. Robert Breast refused. He told the state parole board he wouldn't admit to a crime he did not commit. In October of 2000, Breast asked a New Hampshire judge to allow for retesting of DNA evidence collected as part of the investigation into Susan Randall's murder. Her fingernail clippings. The state had argued that those fingernail clippings showed Susan Randall had gouged and scratched her attacker to the bone. They pointed to the still visible scratches

on Bree's knuckles when Colonel Doyon questioned him those two weeks after they found her body. If that was the case, as the state presented, the blood and other DNA under her fingernail clippings could identify her attacker. Advancements in DNA testing could exonerate Robert Priest. But at the very least, his defense argued, that new DNA evidence would have presented reasonable doubt in the minds of the jury, had it been available at the time of his original trial. The Berkshire Eagle reported that Robert Breast even claimed the police framed him,

and he'd pay for the DNA test himself to prove it. Justice Kathleen McGuire considered this request, and in December of that year, the court allowed three tests for DNA evidence on the fingernail clippings, finding that Breast and his defense were not at fault for not presenting the evidence during the initial 1973 trial. DNA evidence didn't exist yet. According to the Boston Globe, this was the first time New Hampshire allowed DNA results in post-conviction proceedings. Those three tests revealed confounding results. The DNA under Susan Randall's fingertips belonged to not one, but two men.

One of those men was not Robert Priest. But Robert Priest could not be excluded from the second sample. The blood type matched Robert's blood type. But as the defense argued, it would also match one of every 51 Caucasian males in the two New Hampshire counties where Susan was last seen and where her body was found. Though it felt like a little bit of a win for the defense, those results didn't

actually come quickly. It wasn't until 2013 that Robert Breast, along with his new defense team, pursued a new trial based on the DNA findings. The Innocence Project supported Robert Breast in his efforts to petition for a new trial. New York attorney Ian Dumaine volunteered in early 2007 for free after hearing about Robert's case through the Innocence Project. He told the Boston Globe, quote, All the problems you see in wrongful conviction cases are present in this case. A confession from a jailhouse snitch, bad eyewitness identifications, and junk science, unquote. That junk science comment was in reference to the neutron activation analysis

that tied Susan Randall's coat to Brice's car. Apparently, that type of forensic chemical testing was found to be unreliable in the early 1990s. Finally, in February 2017, New Hampshire's highest court handed down their opinion in Robert Breith's appeal for a new trial. Denied. They concluded that the new DNA testing, though found to belong to multiple men, would not have resulted in a different verdict. Explained in the opinion was that the DNA evidence, though it did not conclusively link Breast to the murder and was in possible contrast to the state's assertion that Breast acted alone, it also did not rule Breast out as the killer. DNA evidence is not time-stamped.

That secondary male DNA could have been under Susan's fingernails for days, or even weeks, before the night she disappeared. Robert Breast was not getting a new trial. His conviction and sentence would stand. Carol Breast told New Hampshire Public Radio she was stunned by the ruling, but she stood by her husband of 45 years. They never gave up hope. Meanwhile, Susan Randall's sister Sally told NHPR,

quote, it's like it never ends and it won't end until the day he dies. It will never end, unquote. Do you feel conflicted? Are you asking yourself if justice was truly served in the case of Susan Randall and the man serving time for her murder? I had those same conflicting thoughts that pit in my stomach that maybe the police got it wrong. Maybe the real killer is still out there.

When I first researched the high-level details of this case, the conclusion gnawed at me. But so did another detail. When Robert Breast walked into the Manchester Police Department the very same day Susan Randall's body was recovered from the iced-over surface of the Merrimack River, he told the officer on duty he'd heard about the body, that he thought police might want to talk to him because he'd been, quote, questioned before on things, unquote.

What the hell did he mean by that? I started digging, and I didn't have to dig very deep before I discovered what Robert Breast was alluding to that day at the police department. Robert Breast had been a murder suspect before. In the next episode of Dark Down East, a New Hampshire teacher disappears from her home in Hookset on the 4th of July in 1969. A month later, the remains of a missing 11-year-old Allentown girl are discovered in the trunk of an abandoned car. What happened to Luella Blakeslee?

Who killed Deborah Lee Horn? Are these two New Hampshire cold cases connected? And is Robert Breast as innocent as he claims? Berkshire Eagle, Boston Globe, and New Hampshire Public Radio. It's all available at darkdowneast.com. Follow Dark Down East on Apple Podcasts and be sure to turn on automatic downloads in the top right corner of the app. I don't know about you, but it really grinds my gears when my favorite podcasts don't automatically download because then I set off for a walk or in my car and I don't have any new episodes to play. If you listen on Spotify or another app, same thing.

Hitting follow and setting up auto downloads is the easiest way to support the show and the cases I cover and ensure that you never miss an episode of Maine and New England True Crime Stories. Thank you for supporting this show and allowing me to do what I do. I'm honored to use this platform for the friends and families who have lost their loved ones, and for those who are still searching for answers in cold missing persons and murder cases. I'm not about to let those names or their stories get lost with time. I'm Kylie Lowe, and this is Dark Down East.