NH Serial Killer: Sheila LaBarre, Part Three
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This is Murder, She Told. True crime stories from Maine, New England, and small town USA. I'm Kristen Zevey. You can connect with me at MurderSheTold.com or on Instagram at MurderSheToldPodcast. This is part three of a three-part series. If you haven't listened to parts one or two, please go back and start there.

This episode contains descriptions of domestic violence, assault, and abuse. If this is a trigger for you, please listen with care. If you or somebody you know are struggling with violence in a relationship or in the home, help is available 24-7. Visit hotline.org or your local crisis center or call 800-799-7233. Your life is important and you matter.

As journalists and investigators tore through Sheila's past, trying to learn more about her life, she was stuck in a cell waiting to be formally indicted by a grand jury for Kenneth's murder. After a few months in limbo, her lawyer requested that she be released on bail. But in New Hampshire murder cases, where there is a strong presumption of guilt, there was no chance of release, so she remained incarcerated awaiting trial.

Her animals on the farm, including three older horses, two Shetland ponies, a dog, and a number of rabbits, were all put up for adoption by authorities. The Portsmouth Herald wanted to learn more about her past relationships. Sheila had been legally married three times, four if you count her quasi-common-law marriage to Wilfred LeBar. Her last divorce was filed in New Hampshire, and because of Sheila's request, the records have been sealed.

She told the judge back in July of 1997, By sealing these records, I believe I can truly understand what our state motto means, live free or die. To me, the marriage was my death, and my divorce is my freedom.

The Herald petitioned the court to unseal the records and learn the truth about her brief marriage to Wayne Ennis. Sheila argued that they should remain sealed because it was merely an attempt by the Herald to sell newspapers and that the contents would have no bearing on the pending murder charges. The court granted the newspaper's request over Sheila's objection, and the public learned about her decades-long history of domestic violence.

Wayne grew up in Manchester Parish, Jamaica. After living there for 29 years, he came to America seeking a better life. After living in New England and driving a taxi for a while, he found himself in New Hampshire, harvesting crops as a migrant worker, picking apples or blueberries.

In 1994, Wayne was injured in a car accident. And though he was still mobile, the kinks and soreness made him feel miserable. He wanted to be treated by a chiropractor and he ended up at LaBar's clinic. Sheila was working that day and while Wayne filled out paperwork, she introduced herself. He found her attractive and their casual conversation became flirtatious. She recognized his accent right away.

She'd vacationed in his country in 1989, with Wilfred's money and without the doctor, and she wrote in her journals that she dreamed of a, quote, dark-skinned lover from Jamaica. It was the beginning of his first relationship in the States, and things moved quickly. They soon married, less than a year later on August 22nd, 1995.

Though Sheila continued to show affection and tenderness to Wilfred, maintaining a somewhat romantic relationship, he was tolerant of her new husband and even allowed Wayne to live and work on the farm with her. They were like a family, spending holidays together and catching up over dinner after a long day's work.

Wayne saw Wilfred as a fatherly figure. He showed nothing but kindness to him and paid Wayne to complete odd jobs around the property. But after a brief honeymoon period, he began to learn about Sheila's darker side. He would later write letters to the New Hampshire union leader, revealing what had happened between him and Sheila.

He wrote about an incident where she chased him through the house and around the property with a handgun. He said, She had a handgun with her all the time. She pointed the gun at me, shot over my head, and then told me she was going to send me back to Jamaica in a box. On some winter nights, she forced Wayne to sleep outside, bare skin lying on the icy ground, and the air was so cold he could see his breath when he exhaled. He'd shiver himself to sleep.

One night during a heavy snow, Sheila got into a rage and threw both Wilfred and Wayne into the cold winter air, locking them out of the house. Wilfred headed to a small camper that he kept on the far side of the horse barn and offered to share it with Wayne. Wayne was embarrassed about the situation. His wife had caused this predicament, and he knew how small the camper was, so he volunteered to sleep in the barn, finding some clean hay to lay in.

He wrote, "I didn't know a place on earth so cold." But despite his worry, he survived without serious injury until the morning. "I was ashamed to let anyone know that I was living like this in America," he later wrote. But despite the abuse, no matter how vicious she got during a fight, he said he refused to strike her.

Wayne remembered one time when she was driving him in her pickup, she told him that she wished a horse would kick Wilfred in the head and kill him. She knew what his will had in store for her, and she wanted him dead so she could inherit the farm. You should kill him, she suggested to Wayne.

When Wayne appeared confused, Sheila jerked the wheel, sending cassettes flying across the truck's cabin. Wayne later said, "'When she's like that, I don't trust her. I don't want to refuse her and have her turn on me.' She asked again and he continued to hesitate, so she whipped the truck back and forth on the back roads, slamming his head into the passenger window. He thought to himself, "'I can't do that. I'm not a murderer and Dr. Labar is like a father to me.'"

Wayne wouldn't give her the answer she was looking for, so she slammed on the brakes and ordered him to get out. She sped away and left Wayne to find his own way home. He realized that if she were capable of hiring someone to kill Wilfred, what was to stop her from doing the same to him?

Another incident happened in Hampton Beach, New Hampshire. They had gotten into an argument, so Wayne left the room, giving her space, hoping that she would calm down. But when he returned, she provoked him, goading him to hit her.

When he refused, she stepped back and collected herself. He said that a wicked smile crept across her face. He wrote that she ripped the fabric of her clothes and struck herself. She pulled a shirt collar around her neck, taut, leaving bruises, and then dug her nails into her skin, drawing blood. Then she calmly walked over to the phone, dialed a number, and said, Is this the Hampton Police? I need an officer to come. My husband just assaulted me.

Their eventual divorce wasn't precipitated by the abuse. The final straw was Sheila's infidelity. Wayne walked in on Sheila having sex with another man, Jimmy Brackett, and he'd had enough. In December of 1996, they filed for divorce, and seven months later, in July of 1997, the divorce was finalized and Wayne was free.

Just as the relationship with Wayne was ending, a new one was beginning. James Brackett, who went by Jimmy, was, like Wayne, a patient at the chiropractic clinic. He was in his mid-20s as Sheila was closing in on 40.

Jimmy was learning disabled and very shy, and Sheila liked that about him. They began seeing each other in 1996, when Sheila was still married to Wayne. And when Wayne moved out, Jimmy moved in, living with Sheila at the Hampton apartment, which was perched right on top of the chiropractic clinic that Wilfred owned.

Like Wayne, the three of them had a family dynamic. Wilfred showed them extraordinary kindness. And like Wayne, it didn't take long for their relationship to take a dark turn with escalating arguments and physical fights. In one incident, Sheila grabbed a two-foot-long wooden grill brush that was lying in a nearby sink and hit Jimmy across the face with it, knocking out two of his front teeth and leaving his mouth bruised and bloody.

As he sat, holding his mouth dumbfounded, she told him, I was aiming at your throat.

She accused him of sleeping around, hurting her animals, and damaging property, but none of it was ever true. Reminiscent of Wayne, she would wield a .38-caliber handgun for intimidation, occasionally sending bullets Jimmy's way. In one particularly dramatic incident, Jimmy fled to the camper on the Epping property and locked her out. She retrieved an axe and started to hack her way through the thin sheet metal. Jimmy was trapped.

He searched for an exit when he looked up and saw the camper's roof vent. He shimmied his way through the narrow opening, stood on top of the camper, and leapt from the roof, fleeing on foot. Sheila pursued him, but he was faster. With adrenaline and fear pumping through his veins, he escaped into the thick woods on the property.

Another time, Sheila landed herself in legal hot water. Jimmy went to the hospital seeking treatment for a wound. But before the doctor would stitch him up, he asked him how he'd sustained the injuries in the first place. He asked him what happened. He said that his girlfriend had attacked him with scissors, which explained the two-inch gash in his forehead and damage to his ear. And the doctor called the Hampton police.

An officer quickly arrived, taking some photos and a statement from Jimmy, after which the doctor treated his wounds, stitched him up, and gave him a tetanus shot. A few hours prior, around 4.30 a.m., Sheila and Jimmy were rolling around in their apartment, fighting with weapons. Jimmy had a folding knife and Sheila some pruning shears.

She was injured too, a cut on her palm and her finger. The officer asked Jimmy to come by the station when he was done at the hospital. Before he left, he asked Jimmy if he still had the knife with him and he turned it over. The officer headed to the apartment to get a statement from Sheila. She claimed that Jimmy had attacked her with the folding knife and that she had defended herself with scissors. He put her under arrest and brought her back to the station.

Once she got to the station, she explained that in addition to the wounds, there was also damage to her vagina. When she started to disrobe to show the officer, he said, that's not necessary, and left the room to get a female officer to assist. When Sheila realized he wouldn't be the one behind the camera, she changed her mind, saying she no longer wanted to be photographed. They charged her with second-degree assault and held her until later that afternoon when she'd be arraigned.

Jimmy, similarly, was arrested and charged and held at the station. That afternoon at the courthouse, Sheila and Jimmy faced Judge Francis Frazier, where he read them each their charges. They both pled not guilty. Sheila was already widely known by court staff as polite, prepared, and professional, one of the best pro se litigants they'd ever encountered.

But this time was different. Sheila yelled and talked over Judge Francis during Jimmy's arraignment, and he ordered her to be removed from the courtroom. The officer who had brought her into the courtroom took her downstairs, and as she was being removed, she bellowed, I'm bleeding from the vagina and they won't help me. They called an ambulance to treat her, but she refused, saying that she was just having her period. She then accepted a maxi pad from a court employee and settled down.

The judge was bewildered. He held her at a mental institution for observation for three days before he would consider bail. She returned to face the judge with her attorney. He presented a psychological exam that Sheila was a danger neither to herself nor others, and she was competent to assist in her own legal defense. She had returned to her charming self, and the judge granted her bail, but ordered her to stay 500 feet from Jimmy.

Prosecutors tried to proceed with their case, but neither Jimmy nor Sheila would cooperate, so they abandoned the charges. A few years later, Sheila petitioned to have the charges expunged from their respective criminal records, and the same judge, Francis Frazier, approved the request. The cycle of abuse and reconciliation extended even to the legal system. Jimmy left Sheila many times, but he always came back.

In 2002, Jimmy finally steeled his resolve to leave Sheila. He later said, "I was so desperate to leave that I hitchhiked through a blizzard to a homeless shelter in Portsmouth." He feared that if he had stayed, he would have been killed. He had recalled that she accused him of being a pedophile, and in retrospect, believed that if he had confessed, placating her, it would have been his death sentence.

The vanity plate on the back of Jimmy Brackett's car reads, I'm alive. Many years later, he said that he was lucky to be alive and knew full well he could have been another victim. From 1996 to 2002, Jimmy survived Sheila Labar.

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Sheila waited nearly two years anticipating her trial. She was ready to escape the mundane prison routine and the women who abused her. Sheila hated her cellmate. She complained to her sister that she would scoff and tease her for using the toilet. In one of the court hearings, she complained to the judge that she was suffering from skin problems because she had no control over the temperature of the water during her showers and needed a prescription moisturizer to heal her skin.

Life had changed dramatically since the days on her farm with her animals. In October of 2007, Sheila's lawyers successfully motioned to have her declared indigent by the court, which meant that the state would be picking up the cost of Sheila's legal defense. Her assets were frozen while the order vacating her inheritance and the wrongful death lawsuit from the county family were resolved.

The trial was scheduled to begin in March of 2008, but in February, Sheila's legal team made a bombshell announcement. She essentially admitted that she had murdered Kenneth County and Michael Deloge, but she claimed that she was not guilty by reason of insanity. Up until this point, the state hadn't even charged her with Michael's murder.

After the February hearing, her attorney, Jeffrey Denner, said, Sheila Labar is a deeply sick individual. It is our belief that she could not control her behavior and looked at the world through a different lens. We have felt from the beginning that this is a very sick individual who needs help.

The families of Kenneth and Michael were aghast that she might be able to escape responsibility. But even if Sheila were successful, she would likely be committed to a secure psychiatric unit and wouldn't be free for decades, perhaps the rest of her life. Though it's not hard to imagine a scenario where she could become a model patient and win over her doctors and earn eventual release.

The insanity plea is rare. It's used in less than 1% of criminal cases, and its success rate is about 1 in 4. In an insanity trial, it is the burden of the defense to prove that the defendant was insane. They are presumed to be sane until proven otherwise. In preparation for trial, the defense requested, as part of discovery, the 330 microcassettes that were taken as evidence by investigators from Sheila's residence.

She had been recording herself and others starting in 1990 for the following 15 years, and the cassettes contained over a thousand hours of audio. The prosecution, meanwhile, had their expert witness, forensic psychologist Albert Dractinas, interview Sheila again and examine all of the evidence they'd gathered in preparation for trial.

In early May of 2008, the trial that would decide Sheila's fate began. After a jury of 12 with six alternates were impaneled, they took a field trip to the Epping farm to take a look around, and Sheila joined the jury for the trip. The defense would go first in the trial, and during their opening statements, they laid out their story for the jury.

Attorney Brad Bailey said, This is a woman who sincerely believes that she has been told by God himself to return to earth to find the reason why. A woman who believes she is an angel, a spirit walking among the living, who has returned to earth for a special purpose. He was referring to the suicide attempt I mentioned in episode 1 during her relationship with Ronnie Jennings, after which she remained in a coma for 8 days.

He explained that Sheila had discovered in the years that followed her purpose. She was to rid the world of pedophiles. She believed that being a notary public gave her special powers and allowed her to judge and enact punishment, including executions. She suffered from paranoia, believing that the people in the woods near her house were, quote, out to get her, and that she had been assaulted by ghosts who haunted the farmhouse.

The prosecution described her as crude, manipulative, cruel, and vindictive, someone who lashed out violently at the men she dated.

Assistant Attorney General Anne Rice said that her accusations about child abuse were a way to humiliate the men she killed. She said it was all part and parcel of Sheila's need to control, dominate, and humiliate them. The defense called Sheila's sister to the stand, and she recalled for the jury her nickname for her sister, Crazy Sheila, for her erratic behavior towards men and her cackling laugh.

Malcolm Rogers, the defense's expert witness and forensic psychologist, testified, and he said that he believed Sheila was insane when she killed Kenny and Michael. He explained that her actions were caused by mental illness, which he had diagnosed as a delusional disorder. Her obsession with pedophilia was a symptom of the disorder. He said, "'I think that her experiences as a child "'didn't cause the disorder, "'but contributed to the form that the delusion has taken,'

Another symptom, he explained, was her paranoia, which was evident for years and began to escalate in the years leading up to the murders. The defense played many of Sheila's recordings for the jury. In one, she interrogated Michael Deloge about young girls, accusing him of being a pedophile and describing the sexual acts that she believed he did. She made similar allegations in a recording of her and Kenneth.

Michael gave context for the recordings, saying that she had made those tapes to, quote, document the wrongs that had been done to her, but there was virtually no self-reflection in her role.

In another tape, Sheila said that God told her, you can't remain here in heaven. You must return and you must find the reason why. Malcolm said that her grandiose manner of speech in the recordings was evidence of her belief that she was ordained by a higher power to carry out a special mission. He continued, many of the ideas seem so outlandish that it makes you wonder if she actually believes them. But my interpretation in listening to the tapes is that she does.

Her belief that all the men in her life were pedophiles was part of her delusion. And after playing a recording of her saying, "I believe all pedophiles should be shot on sight. I wish President Bush would enact that into law," he said that, "What is most significant is that Sheila acts in a way that is consistent with her delusional beliefs. It's one of the ways you can determine if someone believes their own delusion or not."

The defense had former tenants of Sheila testify about their experience vacating a property that they were renting from her. They said that she'd entered the apartment in the days leading up to their move and had done some bizarre and terrifying things. She wrote on their wall, "'Vengeance is mine,' saith the Lord."

She turned on all the gas burners on the range and left the oven door open with the gas running. She poured bleach into their aquarium, killing their pet fish. She turned on every light and shattered a glass door, leaving the thousands of glass pieces on the floor when she left.

They called Jimmy Brackett to the stand to testify about her behavior he witnessed, and even the chief of police of Epping to explain that he had fielded at least 150 calls over the years involving her. They produced a notebook of Sheila's that had a Bible verse written in it, Daniel 3, which reads, Your Majesty has issued a decree that everyone who hears the sound of the horn, flute, or harp—

must fall down and worship the image of gold, and that whoever does not will be thrown into a blazing furnace. They connected it to her method of disposing of Kenneth's and Michael's bodies, incinerating them in burn piles on her property using diesel fuel as an accelerant. The prosecution focused on passages that showed her as scheming. One page had the word options written at the bottom, with a list of possibilities for why someone might disappear.

He got a ride to his ma, or he went off with someone.

Finally, the time had come for the state to present their expert witness. Albert told the jury that after reviewing more than 8,000 pages in the case file and interviewing her three times, for a total of about 12 hours, that he believed she was sane when she killed Kenneth and Michael. He stated that she had severe mood disorders, which explained her episodes of rage, her grandiosity, and her suicidal thoughts.

He said that she likely had several personality disorders that explained her paranoia and her lack of empathy for others.

He said that at times she might have psychotic episodes, where she would hear voices, see visions, or have delusional thoughts. But he said despite these disorders, quote, she is not psychotic all the time, and not everything she does is psychotic. He said that she was far more functional than psychotic people he'd treated, and that she didn't present as psychotic during their hours of interviews. He said, quote,

She answered questions well and she tried to explain away evidence that made her look bad, and that is not what he sees in a person who is psychotic. The prosecution played Sheila's account of what happened to Kenneth, an invention of hers, they believed, to minimize her guilt and manipulate the legal system.

She said that they went to sleep in the same bed, and she woke up in the morning to Kenny choking her. She wriggled away and started yelling at him, telling him that he was only with her to steal money to support his drug habit. They argued and fought and ended up in the bathroom, where Kenny slipped in the tub and struck his head. She said, through sobs, He just stared up at me. He didn't move. I started CPR on him. I was screaming his name. I tried everything.

But despite her efforts, Kenny succumbed to his accidental injuries. They called her neighbor, Michelle Bennett, to the stand to explain an incident where Sheila was burning something on the property. She told Michelle, Don't mind the smell. I'm burning my garbage. That same night, Sheila described in detail how she would kill someone. The prosecution recalled a statement Sheila had made. I know my law. Burning a body is just a misdemeanor.

When Jimmy Brackett was on the stand, he took the court back to the incident that landed him in the hospital with four stitches. This was from the attack with the pruning shears or scissors. He testified that after Sheila was granted bail, she told him that the bizarre tantrum that she threw during the arraignment hearing was calculated, an effort to, in her words, play the system.

Albert said that despite these mental illnesses, there was not enough evidence to show a mental illness caused Sheila to commit her crimes. In a trial replete with examples of outlandish behavior, it was ultimately up to the jury to decide whether she was a manipulative and sadistic killer or, legally insane, simply acting in a way that was consistent with her delusion of being an avenging angel.

After more than 40 witnesses and five weeks of testimony, the jury took two days and 13 hours before they returned to the courtroom. When they filed back in, the judge asked if they rendered a unanimous verdict. The foreman said, "We have, Your Honor." The judge then asked, "How do you find the defendant? Guilty or not guilty by reason of insanity?" The jury foreman paused and said, "Guilty, Your Honor."

Sheila's defense attorney, Jeffrey Denner, later said that when the verdict was being read, she collapsed in my arms, saying, Thank God they know I'm sane. She wanted to be sane, but she was the craziest person I had ever met. The judge sentenced Sheila to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Just before the trial began, it was revealed to the public in a preliminary hearing that investigators had discovered, in their initial search of the Epping farm, several severed toes that belonged to neither Kenny nor Michael. They didn't bring it up during the insanity trial, and the information lay dormant for four years when they appealed to the public for help in identifying the unknown man.

Near the time of Sheila's arrest, she had been seen entertaining a man with a thick Irish accent at her favorite date spot, Ashworth-by-the-Sea in Hampton, the same spot that she and Kenny met for the first time. The story, repeated by Michelle Bennett, Sheila's epping neighbor, was that during their date, the Irishman pleaded with another restaurant goer for help, asking them to call the police, that he was afraid she would hurt him, but evidently nothing was done.

No one but Sheila knew the man's name, and she mentioned it herself during one of her encounters with police at the farm. She said, Mr. Depardee, an Irish nut, has been threatening me. Could the remains belong to this mystery Irishman? Even at the time of this recording, 16 years after the discovery, the victim has not been identified. There were hundreds of hours of recorded calls of Sheila talking to men on chat lines, like she did with Kenny.

How many others did she meet in person? Detectives thought this might have been a way for Sheila to find new victims. They asked the public for help in identifying other men who stayed with Sheila over the years. Several people came forward with descriptions and limited information, but they didn't know their current whereabouts.

Investigators believed there might even be others of whom they found no trace. Detective Richard Cody said, If she met a homeless guy in New York City and took him home and killed him, we would never know. She was using every and all means of disposal.

Though Sheila had been held responsible for Kenny and Michael's murders, Kenny's mother, Carolyn, believed that her son's death could have been prevented. She filed a wrongful death lawsuit in March of 2009 against the town of Epping and four individual officers in the Epping Police Department. She had pleaded with the police for help and told reporters that the police saw his condition at Walmart and knew he wasn't okay.

The officers had seen Kenny at the Epping farmhouse two weeks prior and could see how much his condition had deteriorated when they saw him, ashen and injured, in the wheelchair in the aisles of the store.

The attorney representing the defendants, employed by the town through their insurance policy, said that discretionary decisions the officers made were immune from a personal liability lawsuit. The attorney was distinguishing two categories of responsibility: discretionary and ministerial. Ministerial duties are actions the officer is required to perform in a particular way, set out by law, by policy, or by a superior.

For example, it is an officer's duty to stop at a motor vehicle accident and render aid. The only exception would be if they did their discretionary duties in a wanton or reckless manner.

They said, more specifically, that their decision not to take either Sheila or Kenneth into custody during or after the incident at Walmart was discretionary. They pointed to the state domestic violence law that said officers can arrest a person for abuse without a warrant if they find probable cause, and it was up to the officers to make that discretionary judgment at Walmart.

As part of the normal course that a civil suit takes, the town's attorney filed a motion to dismiss it. Rockingham County Superior Court Judge Kenneth McHugh denied the motion, ruling that the suit had merit. The judge said, "...if Carolyn's facts were true, a reasonable juror could find that the town of Epping, by the inaction of its officers, enabled Sheila Labar to detain, abuse, and eventually murder Kenneth."

The town had a statutory duty to protect Kenneth from further abuse once officers encountered him in Walmart. The officers saw evidence of abuse right in front of them and failed to intervene.

Three months after the suit was filed, the first blow to Carolyn's case came when the same judge dismissed the town of Epping from the suit, agreeing with their attorneys that because of a rather confusing state law, the municipality was immune to suits arising from an officer's potentially negligent actions. That left the four individual officers as the remaining defendants.

Another blow to her case came when two superior officers, neither of whom were present at Walmart, were also dismissed from the suit. The two remaining defendants were Richard Cody and Sean Gallagher.

Finally, in October of 2010, a year and a half after legal arguments, Judge Kenneth McHugh dealt the lawsuit its final blow. In his decision, he wrote, There was no evidence that the officers acted in bad faith. There was no evidence that Richard or Sean did anything dishonest or intentional that led to Kenneth's death.

For the lawsuit to go to trial, there must be an allegation of intentional conduct, dishonest purpose, furtive design, or ill will, which can be neatly summarized as bad faith actions. The lawsuit that Kenneth's estate had filed against Sheila, however, had succeeded. A summary judgment of $1 million had been awarded.

But there were a lot of people in line to get paid from Sheila's remaining assets. Carolyn explained that even if it was paid, she didn't stand to benefit from it because she wasn't part of Kenneth's estate. She said, I wasn't in it for the money. I was in it for my son because it cost him. It cost him with his life.

On the early spring morning of April 28th, 2009, a crowd of 75 waited to see who would bid on the once lavish farmhouse of Sheila Labar. The grass was in desperate need of mowing. The white paint on the house's exterior was cracked and peeling. Most of the windows were boarded up with plywood, covering up damage from vandalism. The home warped and bowed in neglect. It would need a lot to repair.

and whoever bought it would have to face another grim reality. At least two men were murdered there and turned into ash in the front yard. Carolyn Lodge, who doubted anyone would bid on the property, waited along with the rest of the group. Her wish was to see the house demolished and the land left alone. She hoped that a new owner would permit Kenneth's memorial shrine to remain at the edge of the property, honoring the past but allowing the community to heal and move forward.

The people who were there to bid had their paddles ready. Auctioneer James St. Jean called out the numbers in a lightning cadence. Only a handful of the people in the crowd were actually there to bid, one of whom was Brant Hardy, a local accountant, bidding on behalf of the Harvey family who once owned the farm. The family wanted to take back their farm and restore the land. He thought he would be unopposed, but he found himself in a bidding war with a woman in a red coat.

After the price rapidly rose to $400,000, it was down to just the two remaining bidders. The price rose bit by bit. There was some headroom. The appraisal of the property had come in at $860,000.

Things slowed down a bit as the bidding rose to $550,000. Bonnie Marouv, a neighbor who lived down the street from the farmhouse, said, "'My wish for the property is simple. This land has seen so many hellacious things. I hope the new owner will let it have peace.'" A few more bids were made when James St. Jean said, "'Going once, going twice, sold for $600,000 to the lady in red.'"

There was a collective sigh from the crowd when the gavel came down. The crack of it striking the sounding block released tension from the crowd. Another chapter had ended. If you have any information about other possible victims of Sheila LaVar, please contact the Epping Police Department at 603-679-5122.

I want to thank you so much for listening. I'm so grateful that you chose to tune in and I couldn't be here without you. Thank you. If you want to support the show, there's a link in the show notes with options. Telling a friend about the show or leaving a review are some of the best ways to support an indie podcast.

A detailed source listing can be found on the website at MurderSheTold.com. Special thanks to Kevin Flynn and his book Wicked Intentions, and Russ Choma of the New Hampshire Union Leader, whose work was integral to this three-part series. This episode was co-written by Zoe Stockwell. Special thanks to Byron Willis for his research and writing support, and to Delphi Borich for her research support.

If you have a story suggestion or a correction, feel free to reach out at hello at MurderSheTold.com. My only hope is that I've honored your stories by keeping the names of your family and friends alive. I'm Kristen Sevey, and this is Murder She Told. Thank you for listening. I'm sending my Aunt Tina money directly to her bank account in the Philippines with Western Union. She's the self-proclaimed bingo queen of Manila, and I know better to interrupt her on bingo night, even to pick up cash. Hey!

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