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Cold-case team nabs suspected serial killer

Retired publisher, law enforcement officials mesh well

Todd Hartman, Rocky Mountain News

Published July 29, 2006 at midnight

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They scratch out theories over coffee, organize scattered case files - even vacation together.

The aging trio that make up El Paso County's volunteer cold-case squad have grown close during the past five years, the relationship propelled largely by their successful investigation into the alleged serial killings of Robert Charles Browne.

Dubbed by an office secretary as "The Apple Dumpling Gang" after a goofball Disney movie from 1975, the pair of retired law enforcement officers and, oddly enough, a former newspaper publisher all play their role, shaking old trees in a quest to bring peace to families still wondering what happened to dead or vanished loved ones.

On Friday, a dazzled media corps smothered the trio. "It was a zoo," said one member, 79-year-old Charlie Hess.

With cell phones pinned to their ears, television cameras in their faces and newspaper photographers asking for a group shot, they repeated the tale of how they collared a man possibly responsible for as many as 49 murders. It's a total that - if true - would put Browne among the most prolific killers in American history.

The three men - retired Colorado Springs homicide Detective Lou Smit, 71; former FBI and CIA agent Hess; and ex-Colorado Springs Gazette publisher Scott Fischer, 60 - represent a highly unusual law enforcement squad: an unpaid unit that does nothing but toy around with cases that long ago went cold.

"You get retired men together, we drink coffee and shoot the breeze, and all we had to do was look into these old cases," said the modest Smit, a highly regarded investigator best known for his work on the 1996 Jon Benet Ramsey murder and his belief that an intruder, not the parents, killed the 6-year-old Boulder girl.

Formation of a team

The group came together about 2001, all from different paths.

The first member was Hess, who had developed connections at the Sheriff's Office after his son-in-law was murdered in 1991. His daughter had also worked on former Sheriff John Anderson's campaign.

Hess moved to Colorado Springs from San Diego in the aftermath of his son-in-law's murder to be close to his daughter, and was impressed with El Paso County's work solving the case.

That, and he didn't want to spend his later years "sitting on the couch and watching TV."

His interest eventually led him to volunteer to sort through old cases.

Then came Smit. He was already well-established in southern Colorado, having worked some 200 homicides in a long career at the Colorado Springs Police Department. He was best known for cracking the Heather Dawn Church case, the killing of a 13-year-old girl that first brought Browne to authorities' attention.

Smit, by then retired, also wanted to stay busy. A meticulous investigator known for tenacity and remarkable organizational skills, Smit volunteered to review old cases with Hess.

Soon after, Fischer - retired from a long career in newspapers, including his last stop at The Gazette - joined the team.

Fischer had a lifelong love of law enforcement. He started his journalism career in Clovis, N.M., where, as a teenager, he recalls going to crime scenes to shoot one roll of film for the paper - and another role for the Police Department.

After retiring from The Gazette, he passed a training program at the Sheriff's Office, making him a reserve deputy. Like Smit, Fischer was also a close friend of Anderson. Fischer wanted to work cold cases, too.

All three bring a different set of skills. Fischer and Smit are good with computers, for example; Hess, less so. "I can't even turn one on," he said. "And I have no intention of ever learning."

Said Hess' wife, Jo: "Charlie will write the notes, and sometimes he just infuriates, figuratively speaking, Lou and Scott because they'll be looking for something on their computer and Charlie will find it (in his notes) before they can get it on the computer."

Hess and Smit are both masters at interviewing suspects. It was Hess who entered into the long dialogue through letters and visits that pointed to Browne as a serial killer.

Smit was left out this time, since he shepherded the probe that put Browne in prison in the first place, for the killing of Church.

"(Browne) has not looked at Lou as a person he ever wanted to talk to," Fischer said.

Hess developed a strong rapport with Browne. He returned to prison Friday to visit Browne, to make sure the media onslaught hadn't damaged their relationship. It hadn't.

"He was nonplussed," Hess said. "He was unconcerned about the publicity." In fact, Browne pointed out to Hess that the Rocky Mountain News had carried a large picture of the investigator on its inside pages.

Long hours spent together

Initially, the trio wasn't sure the case would turn out this way.

"There was a lot of speculation this guy (Browne) was a goofball and was just trying to trade for something," Fischer said. "Charlie believed there was something there, and Lou had always thought he might be a serial killer."

The three spend long hours together, mostly on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They meet for coffee in the morning, for lunch and sometimes for dinner - with all the in-between time in an office on the second level of the Sheriff's Office in Colorado Springs.

Fischer does a lot of the driving. He drove Hess back and forth to Cañon City to meet with Browne, in part, because of Hess' bad hip.

Smit does the most traveling, flying across the country on his continued work on the Ramsey case and to help departments in other states and Colorado set up cold-case units.

Most recently, the trio piled into Fischer's SUV for a 10-day fishing trip to the Sea of Cortez off Baja California. They brought back three ice chests packed with yellowtail.

"The three of them work together just fantastically," Jo Hess said.

"They have a way of working where they all seem to be on the same page. They'll kick around the clues or the information.

"It's amazing how they'll all come up with something."

or 303-892-5048

Comments

  • February 29, 2008

    1:50 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    donnadempsey writes:

    I was told that Hess has written a book on cold cases the 3 of them have solved, is this true.

    Have they solved the case of the Feb 14th (year ??) killing of Casandra Rundle and her 2 children, they lived in the south end of Colo Spgs off Cheyenne Rd. I believe.

    Keep up the good work.