The murder of Helen Mae Dutcher
Ferndale, Oakland County, Michigan · 1979
Overview
Helen Mae Dutcher, 36, was stabbed to death in Ferndale, Michigan, a Detroit suburb, in 1979; Wikipedia gives the date as December 1, and the Associated Press reported that her body was found in an alley. Police suspected Coral Eugene Watts for years but never charged him, because, the AP reported, they assumed he would be in his 80s if he ever left a Texas prison. Watts had pleaded guilty in Texas in 1982 to burglary with intent to murder, in exchange for immunity on killings he confessed to, and received 60 years; an appeals ruling and mandatory release laws cut that term so that he was due out in 2006. In January 2004 Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox discussed the case on national cable television. The Attorney General's office said an eyewitness to the Dutcher killing called the next morning. The man said he had watched from his porch. There was no physical evidence, and Watts had never confessed to this killing. Over a defense challenge to the witness's memory after 25 years, a jury in Pontiac heard him, and heard about Watts's Texas confessions, which the judge admitted as evidence of a pattern. On November 17, 2004 it found Watts guilty. He was sentenced to life without parole on December 7, 2004, and died in prison in 2007.
How it was solved
There was no forensic breakthrough in the Dutcher case; there was a witness. For 25 years, the Associated Press reported, police in Michigan suspected Coral Eugene Watts but never charged him, because they assumed he would be in his 80s if he ever got out of prison in Texas. That calculation collapsed when a 1989 appeals ruling and mandatory release laws cut his 60-year Texas sentence and left him due for release in 2006. In January 2004 Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox discussed the Watts case on a national cable television show, and the Attorney General's office said an eyewitness to Dutcher's killing called its office the next morning. The man, who said he had watched from his back porch, said he had told police years earlier what he saw. At trial the defense questioned whether anyone could identify a stranger in a dark alley from 85 feet away, and whether his memory held after 25 years. Prosecutors said there was little or no physical evidence tying Watts to the Texas killings, and Watts had not confessed to Dutcher's. Oakland County Circuit Judge Richard Kuhn ruled that the jury could hear about Watts's confessions to 13 other killings as evidence of a pattern of behavior, and women who survived attacks by Watts testified. On November 17, 2004 the jury found Watts guilty, and on December 7 he was sentenced to the mandatory term of life in prison without parole. He died of prostate cancer in 2007.
Sources
- Serial killer guilty in 1979 murder case
“Coral Eugene Watts, 51, was found guilty of stabbing 36-year-old Helen Dutcher to death in a Detroit suburb in 1979. He faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.”
- Confessed Serial Killer Convicted in Mich.
“Earlier Wednesday, authorities in Kalamazoo, Mich., charged Watts with murder in the 1974 stabbing death of 19-year old Gloria Steele, a Western Michigan University student.”
- Trial begins for serial killer set to go free
“In Dutcher’s case, Oakland County Circuit Judge Richard Kuhn has ruled that Watts’ decades-old confession can be admitted in his trial, saying the other 13 killings show a pattern of behavior. He has not confessed to the Dutcher slaying.”
- Texas serial killer could walk the streets again
“Earlier this year, a Michigan man who saw a TV report on the Watts case came forward to say he saw Watts struggle with Helen Mae Dutcher, 36, who was stabbed 12 times in the Detroit suburb of Ferndale in 1979.”
- Conviction Keeps Serial Killer in Jail
“Police had suspected Watts in Dutcher's death for years, but never charged him because they assumed he would be in his 80s if he ever got out of prison in Texas.”
- Jury Selection Begins in Serial Killer Trial
“He resurfaced in January after he saw Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox on television appealing for help in solving the case.”
- Convicted serial killer Coral Eugene Watts sentenced to life for 1979 murder (Michigan Attorney General release)
“The murder conviction against Watts resulted from the resurfacing of an eyewitness to Dutcher’s murder. In January, the eyewitness called the Attorney General’s office the morning after Cox discussed the Watts case on a national cable television show.”
- 'Deborah Norville Tonight' for Nov. 16
“Watts is now being tried in Michigan for the murder of another woman, Helen Dutcher (ph). She was stabbed 12 times in a Detroit suburb back in 1979.”
- People v Watts, No. 266959 (Mich. Ct. App. Apr. 25, 2006) (Gloria Steele case)
“an admitted serial murderer, in Michigan and Texas in the 1970s and early 1980s prior to defendant's imprisonment for 2 nonfatal assaults in Texas pursuant to a plea agreement in which he was granted immunity on a number of murders, but not the Steele murder.”
- Carl Eugene Watts
“a 36-year-old woman who died after being stabbed 12 times on December 1, 1979”