Fatal Friends, Deadly Neighbors Read online

  PS I just didn’t want you guys to stay up all night worrying.

  As emotionally abusive as he was to his wife, Steven Powell rarely dated after they separated. He did fancy himself a lady’s man and was especially attracted to women in their twenties.

  Steven had an alter ego—Steven Chantry—who wrote poems and songs that he recorded in a soft, pleasant voice. Many of his lyrics were interesting, but most of the tunes were the same, and they were usually dedicated to an impossible love object. Steven had aspirations to be a famous recording artist. He often used his “career” as a conversational approach to young women.

  To an outsider, Steven Powell, who was forty-six at the time, didn’t appear to be an abusive woman hater. He was about five feet, ten inches tall, and he had fairly handsome, somewhat delicate features. His dark hair, which he styled in a pompadour, was beginning to turn gray at the temples. His normal expression was mild, as if he could be no danger to anyone.

  But Steven Powell controlled his offspring firmly, seeming to be in no hurry to have them become independent. John and Alina never moved out of Steven’s house; Michael joined the army for four years and seemed to be leaving the nest. But when he was mustered out, he moved back home and it appeared that nothing had changed. Eventually, Michael did move to Minnesota to attend college.

  Josh, of course, stayed with his father until he was twenty-six. It isn’t difficult to feel sorry for the teenager that Josh Powell was in 1992. His father played him like a yo-yo, and although Josh showed some bravado in his note, one can also see that he wanted Steven Powell to tell him to come home.

  Josh’s social ineptness and, again, false bravado, show in another letter he wrote during the same period. It was addressed to a girl, Cynthia,1 and he heavily edited it, with whole sentences scratched out. He may never have actually sent it; “VOID” is scribbled in black ink across the first page.

  Cynthia,

  It’s illegal for me to be here right now. It always was. Before I wasn’t too worried because it’s unlikely that the wrong people would find out. The people who know me like me [most of them] and no one cares that I’m here.

  If Jack* sees me and turns me in I could be arrested. Do you think I care about that? And about you?

  Lynn* may think I’m ignoring her, and you may think I don’t care about her, but I have spent more time with Lynn this past couple of months than I’ve spent with anyone. If you want examples, I went to her house for several hours just the other day. Lynn and I spending quality time together—untill [sic] she invited us over to Scott’s* house. After that she hardly payed [sic] attention to me because she was talking to Scott. That doesn’t bother me. I hardly noticed it at the time.

  Lynn and I are good friends and I don’t think that’ll change.

  For me high school is just a place to make and see friends, and that is what it’s always been. [crossed out] When it comes to friends I make a special effort to see you through. People just happen to introduce me to their friends and [crossed out] alot of times I forget their names. Sometimes forget even having met them. Then I always try to remember them and say hi when I see them.

  Josh next mentioned a girl who “has no friends” and said he always tried to be “nice” to her, but he scratched that out so thoroughly that it is difficult to read that paragraph.

  “I like knowing alot of people,” he continued. “So if that was a problem, you should have told me without getting mad.

  “Friday night you were too busy with everyone else . . . so when I saw one of my friends I decided to go say hi. I thought I would see you third quarter . . .”

  It is poignantly clear that the teenage Josh Powell really didn’t have any friends and was probably making up the story about being “illegal” to sound more interesting.

  He found living in his car was impossible, and he didn’t have anyone he could move in with, so he returned to his father’s house. How privy he was to Steven Powell’s secrets may never be known. Certainly, no one outside the family and his ex-wife had any idea about the depth of Steven’s hidden obsessions about sex and younger women.

  When he was in his teens, Josh had made a halfhearted attempt to commit suicide, and he once actually pulled a knife on his mother. He had also killed family pets. There is no record of his getting counseling or being treated by a psychologist or psychiatrist after those incidents.

  It was almost ten years before Josh Powell met Susan Cox. He was so damaged by then that disaster loomed ahead like an oncoming train. Josh Powell would one day become one of the most hated men in America, and yet one wonders exactly what drove him to it.

  * * *

  1 The names of some individuals have been changed. Such names are indicated by an asterisk (*) the first time each appears in the narrative.

  Chapter Five

  In December 2009, Susan was still living with Josh and their sons in West Valley City. She had told friends that she “wouldn’t take this crap” from Josh any longer, and if things didn’t change for the better by their ninth anniversary, on April 6, 2010, she was going to leave him. Susan wasn’t a meek goody-goody, and she used words like crap when they were called for. She wanted a life. She wanted Charlie and Braden to have a life. And she was almost at the very straggly ends of her rope.

  Susan Powell wasn’t as brave as she sounded, however, she was afraid. She had hidden a letter in a safe deposit box, along with her will. She wrote that she might suffer an accidental death, and asked that someone check into it. She told no one out loud about this fear.

  She wasn’t exactly asking for help; Susan wanted justice, even as she realized that might be all she would ever get. She had exhausted almost every avenue of help she considered. She had prayed, sought counseling, tried to go along with Josh’s rules, tried to be a good mother no matter what blockades he put up in her way, and then prayed again.

  Even her own parents and sisters had no idea how bad things were for Susan. If they had, they would have stepped in and, somehow, done their best to get her and the boys safely away from Josh.

  And then, in the late fall of 2009, it seemed that things were getting better in Susan’s situation. Josh had a new job—this time as a temp doing books and computer work for a trucking firm. He was called to work for them now and again, and he could do many of his computer tasks at home. His new employer apparently liked his performance, so much so that he was hired as a full-time employee.

  “We were pleased and relieved,” Chuck recalls. “Christmas was coming, they both had jobs, and it looked as though it might be all right after all.”

  Susan wasn’t so optimistic. Although she made preparations for Christmas, she still marked April 6, 2010, in her mental calendar. Her closest friends were forewarned of her anxiety. Josh had had myriad jobs before, jobs that gave her hope—but he always ended up being fired. And his behavior toward her hadn’t improved all that much. She would stay five more months. It seemed to her that it would be a miracle if her husband actually changed, and she hoped for that, but she was fully prepared to leave him in April if she had to.

  * * *

  December 6, 2009, was a Sunday, a bitterly cold day in the Salt Lake City area, with icy, windblown rain and half a foot of snow piling up on the ground. The minimum temperature was 10 degrees. It wouldn’t get any higher than 25 degrees. In the desert areas of Utah, the wind roared across the plains and whistled down the thousands of mine shafts there. It was not a day when anyone would choose to go out into the weather—not unless they had to.

  When Susan’s friend JoVonna Owings dropped in, she invited her to stay for a late brunch, and Josh seemed okay with that. In fact, he seemed more convivial than usual. Although he never cooked, he announced that he would make pancakes for them. He made a big deal of how he served the hotcakes, designating each stack to a particular person. He carefully set Susan’s plate in front of her.

  It turned out to be a pleasant meal, although Susan began to feel ill and very tired soon after. At about f
ive, her stomach was upset and she vomited, apologizing to her friend as she explained that she had to lie down for a while. JoVonna told her not to worry about it and left. Josh said he was going to take the boys—Charlie, four, and Braden, two—out sledding for a while.

  One of their neighbors saw Josh’s blue Chrysler minivan pull back into his driveway between eight and eight thirty. As most of those living on their street did in deference to the cold, Josh pulled his vehicle into the garage.

  That night was uneventful as families went to bed; most of the parents had to start the workweek in the morning.

  One neighbor, however, was awake into the early morning hours. She was sick with something like the flu and she was too uncomfortable to sleep.

  At about 2 A.M., the woman heard someone arguing loudly outside. She listened because it sounded serious, but she didn’t know what to do. A man was yelling, “Get in the car! Get in the car!”

  Then she heard a woman shouting, “No! No! You’re going to hurt me if I do!”

  Apparently the woman had finally gotten into the car, but within a minute, the neighbor woman heard the vehicle come to a brake-screeching stop.

  Then the argument and shouting began again.

  “Get back in the car, right now,” the man ordered.

  Evidently, the woman did what he said because the argument stopped. The witness peeked through her window and saw a light-colored minivan racing away.

  She didn’t call the police, thinking she had probably just overheard a family argument, and she didn’t want to be a busybody. Still, the incident troubled her and she didn’t sleep much that night, wondering if she should have done something more.

  * * *

  Neither Susan nor Josh arrived at work the next morning, nor did they call in sick that Monday of December 7, 2009. Even if Susan’s nausea had been the precursor of the flu or serious stomach trouble, she would have phoned her supervisors at Wells Fargo. Or she would have asked Josh to call. It wasn’t in her nature to simply fail to show up at her job without any explanation. Even more disturbing, the Powells didn’t call the day-care mom, who expected Charlie and Braden, to let her know that the boys wouldn’t be coming.

  Since Josh often worked at home, it wasn’t particularly unusual for him to be away from the trucking company’s offices, so no one there was concerned about his absence.

  No one saw any of the Powell family around their house that Monday. Their day-care provider tried to call them, but no one answered. Alarmed, she called Josh’s mother, Terry Powell, and his sister Jennifer Graves—both of whom lived nearby—to tell them how concerned she was. They too tried to get in touch with Josh and Susan, with no success. Neither of the missing pair answered their cell phones.

  Susan had told many women in her circle about her fears, and that may have been why the babysitter called Josh’s family—and why Terry called the West Valley City Police Department with a “check on the welfare” request at 10 A.M. Although an adult has to be missing for at least forty-eight hours before an official search is begun, and it was awfully soon to file a missing person’s report, the investigators heard the anxiety in Terry’s and Jennifer’s voices, and with their permission, activated a missing person’s report at once.

  Still, at this point, there could be some reasonable explanation for all four of the Powells being gone.

  * * *

  Jennifer Graves finally reached Josh Powell’s cell phone at 5:27 that afternoon. At first she felt relief, but when she asked him where he was, and he told her he was at work, she knew that didn’t compute.

  “You’re lying, Josh,” his sister said. “We know you’re not at work. Where are you?”

  Josh then changed his story and told Jennifer that he and the boys had been camping.

  “Well, you’d better get home. The police are there, and Susan is missing.”

  “How much do you know?” Josh asked Jennifer.

  “What do you mean,” she responded. “Why did you ask me that?”

  Josh hung up.

  Twenty minutes later, in an attempt to avoid unnerving Josh Powell more, West Valley City police detective Ellis Maxwell borrowed Jennifer Graves’s cell phone and used that to dial Josh’s number. Josh picked up, seeing his sister’s number on the Caller ID.

  Maxwell identified himself and told Josh to return to his house as soon as possible.

  “I have to get my sons something to eat first,” Josh said. “Then I’ll be home.”

  It was close to an hour before Josh drove up. Detective Maxwell walked up to the passenger side of the minivan before Josh could exit the driver’s seat.

  “People have been looking for you,” Maxwell said. “Why didn’t you answer your cell phone or call someone all day today?”

  “I had to keep my phone turned off to save the battery,” Josh replied. “I don’t have a phone charger.”

  That was a ridiculous excuse. Maxwell could clearly see Josh’s mobile phone resting on a front seat console. The phone was plugged into a cigarette lighter phone charger.

  Josh appeared to be shocked to learn that people—including his own mother and sister—had been concerned enough about his family’s safety to call the police. He said he and the boys were fine. And as Maxwell peered into the backseats, he was reassured to see Charlie and Braden Powell, who did, indeed, appear to be in good shape.

  But where was Susan? No one saw her get out of the minivan.

  Detective sergeant Ellis Maxwell, who would soon be appointed the lead detective on the “missing person” case by West Valley City police chief Thayle “Buzz” Nielsen, asked Josh to get the boys settled and then come to police headquarters so they could talk more about where he’d been. And, of course, he also wanted to talk about where Susan Powell might be.

  Josh agreed to come down, and that evening he and Maxwell talked.

  Josh said he had taken Charlie and Braden out camping about midnight in the Simpson Springs area of the west desert, farther west than the Cedar Fort area in Tooele County.

  Josh explained that he wanted to test his new generator to be sure it was working well. That seemed dangerous to Maxwell. What if the generator didn’t work well, or if dangerous fumes filled the minivan where boys only two and four were sleeping? Maxwell noted that, but he didn’t argue with Josh, who continued talking.

  “I actually thought it was a little after twelve thirty A.M. on Saturday night—not Sunday,” he explained. “I was confused and I missed a whole day of work. That’s why I didn’t call my company—I believed that I’d be fired if I called in.”

  That didn’t make a lot of sense, either, but Ellis Maxwell moved on to his next question, “Where do you think Susan is?”

  Josh shrugged. “I have no idea. All I know is that she should have gone to work today.”

  Maxwell observed that Powell showed very little concern or anxiety about the police questions concerning Susan. The detective found that strange.

  * * *

  After that first interview ended, Josh gave his consent to the West Valley City police to search both his house and his vehicle. The minivan did appear to be packed for camping. The investigators found the new generator, blankets, a gas can, tarps—and a shovel. They also found Susan Powell’s cell phone in the center front console. It was turned off. On further inspection, they discovered that the digital sim card was missing.

  Asked why Susan’s mobile phone happened to be in the van if he had seen her last at home, Josh had no explanation. All he knew was that she was there, sleeping in their house when he, Charlie, and Braden went camping after midnight. Susan hadn’t felt well enough to join them so they had left without her.

  “Why didn’t you guys check with Susan today?” Josh asked. “You could have asked her where the boys and I were.”

  Josh appeared to be surprised when they told him that no one had been able to locate Susan, that she hadn’t shown up at the Wells Fargo offices.

  As for his winter camping trip with Charlie and Braden,
Josh made it sound as if it was the most natural thing in the world to have a late-night adventure with his boys on a snowy night in December. If they had been ten and twelve, that might be—but they were two and four.

  Josh had no idea where Susan had gone. Her bicycle was still in the garage, but then she wouldn’t have been able to ride it with snow on the streets and sidewalks.

  Although he was mystified about where Susan might be, he didn’t see why the investigators were asking so many questions about his camping trip.

  That, in itself, struck detectives as peculiar.

  Why anyone would take toddlers out to camp in a blizzard at midnight was the question on everyone’s mind. And it would keep coming back to niggle at investigators in the months to come.

  After his van was thoroughly searched, the West Valley City investigators moved on to the Powells’ house. Susan Powell wasn’t there—sick, alive, or dead. Outside of Josh, Charlie, and Braden, there was no one there. But it wasn’t exactly normal inside, either. The couch was wet, as if it had just been shampooed. Two fans were pointed at the couch, whirling away, perhaps in an effort to dry it off. There were some unidentified stains on the tile floor next to the carpet portion near that couch. If something terrible had happened, criminalists would have to test all of the wet and stained items.

  Although the probe into the whereabouts of Susan Powell was growing more ominous, there were still plausible reasons for the wet couch and fans. Little boys are well known for spilling things.

  All of the items that Susan would surely have taken with her if she decided to leave Josh and her boys were still in the master bedroom: her clothes, makeup, purse, credit cards, cash, identification, driver’s license, and her keys.

  And her cell phone had been found in Josh’s Chrysler van.

  * * *

  One of the more modern tools of forensic science is the ability of detectives to follow cell phone “pings” from the towers that are sprinkled all across America. Ellis Maxwell and his crew now subpoenaed Josh and Susan’s phone records to see who—if anyone—either of them might have called on Sunday or through the daytime hours of Monday. The last call made or received on Susan’s phone was at 2:29 P.M. on Sunday. That proved to be a call Susan had made to JoVonna Owings, who came over to visit shortly thereafter.