MURDER SHE WROTE?: Being Able to Find Items in Your Landfill When You Really Have To

摘要

Mesa County is located in west central Colorado. The geographic size of the County is large at 3,309 square miles. Topography of the area is diverse, ranging from alpine meadows, slick rock canyons, farm ground and barren desert. Throughout the year temperature fluctuations range from minus 10 to 105 degrees Fahrenheit. Mesa County's desert topography receives about 10 inches of precipitation annually. The County has a population of approximately 120,000 people. Most of the County's population resides within close proximity of the County seat, Grand Junction, Colorado. These residents, in combination with the County's regional retail sales activity, generate approximately 150,000 tons of municipal solid waste per year. These waste materials are accepted at the County owned Mesa County Landfill at the rate of 500 tons per day. The Mesa County Landfill is located just south of Grand Junction at 3071 U.S. Highway 50. On November 13, 2001, the 911 Dispatch Center received a call requesting law enforcement response to a report of burglary and missing persons. Sheriff's Department Officers responding to the scene discovered a ransacked house, blood on the bed within the master bedroom and two missing people. Those missing were 34-year-old Jennifer Blagg and her six-year-old daughter Abby. Dealing with the issue of missing persons, the Sheriff's Office along with hundreds of volunteers initiated a County wide search for the mother and daughter. While outwardly and aggressively searching the County's broad expanses of open space, behind the scenes, investigators approached Mesa County Solid Waste Management about the prospect of searching for bodies within the Mesa County Landfill. Given the lag time between the disappearance and considering the landfill as a search location, the investigators were concerned with whether a specific search area could be delineated. A review of the log maintained by the compactor operator for the period of time immediately following the disappearance narrowed the search to an area of approximately 150 square feet. Calling upon data in the form of annually updated aerial photos and digitized topographic mapping it was determined that the depth of the fill within the search area tapered from 15 feet to daylight on the western edge.