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Detectives, medical examiner testify in Brent Bogseth murder trial

Posted at 9:05 PM, Sep 09, 2016
and last updated 2016-09-09 21:05:43-04

PAW PAW, Mich. — One year ago today, Kimberley’s Bogseth body was found. Friends spotted her body lying in a wooded area behind her home in Grand Junction. Days later, her husband Brent Bogseth was arrested. Since then he’s been accused of killing his wife with a hammer and burying her body. Friday was the third day of his murder trial.

“It appeared with the gaping hole that potentially there could’ve been fragments that were missing,” said Medical Examiner Frida Osborne about Kimberley’s head. “It would be left up to forensic pathology, anthropology to determine if all those pieces are being put back together.”

Osborne was the first to testify at the courthouse in Paw Paw and was one of the first to see Kimberly’s body lying on the ground that day last September. She spoke about what she noticing skull fracture to Kimberly's head. Other detectives testified about seeing plastic bags within yards of the body, similar to what another investigator saw near the house.

“Laying alongside the porch were a couple of black plastic trash bags that were just laying on the ground,” said Det. Lt. Tom Macyauski with Van Buren County Sheriff's Office. “It didn’t appear to have been opened up or used but they were both sitting right there next to the door entry when you came in.”

Det. Lt. Macyauski said he searched everywhere for evidence — inside Brent's home, outside the house and even his workplace in South Haven. It was there, in a tool shed, that he saw a hammer similar to the one found in Brent’s car.

For a few hours, other detectives and specialists talked about obtaining the Bogseth’s phone records and what they found. Paul Gonyeau with the Michigan State Police Technical Services Unit looked through days and days of text exchanges between Brent and Kimberly and noticed something peculiar on September 1, 2015.

“From 6:36 a.m. to through 9:24 a.m. there were approximately 61 text message exchanged that Sprint recorded between Brent Bogseth and Kimberley Bogseth,” said Gonyeau. “In my extractions of both of those devices those text communications are not present.”

He said September 1 was the last time Kimberly texted anyone. Det. Ben Ludwig also sifted through their phone records. He looked at Brent’s phone to track his whereabouts, knowing that each text pings to nearby cell tower. He noticed the day Kimberly’s body was found, one text from his phone pinged to a tower in Paw Paw and another one hit a tower miles south of his home.

“The ping that was up in that area, came roughly, I believe it was, half an hour or 45 minutes after her body was found and police personnel were on scene,” said Det. Ludwig. “Then you see the next ping from that cell phone, after it is in the area of Kimberley body, pinged down near Gary, Indiana.”

Det. Ludwig mentioned that Brent’s parents lived in the Chicago area and that’s where he may have been headed.

The Bogseth murder trial continues next week.