A Killing in Amish Country: Sex, Betrayal, and a Cold-blooded Murder Read online

  As Mark Weaver worked at his welding job, he thought of how he would rather be fishing. He liked his work—mostly welding cylinders and parts for Amish businesses—but some of the best fishing on Lake Erie was in June.

  Mark (no relation to Eli) was in his late thirties, the father of four young children. He and his wife, Elsie, had met Barbara Weaver and her children when Eli first left his family and Barbara and her children rented a house nearby. Mark met Eli as he came and went from the English life he was living then. When Eli moved home again and repented and was forgiven, he, Barbara, and the children moved across the road to the house with the adjoining store. Eli and Mark started hunting and fishing together.

  Friends describe Mark as stocky, very friendly, and a helpful kind of person. At one time he had a welding shop at his home and would fix things for free for neighbors. For generations his Old Order family had farmed Wayne County. That was then, and this was now. His father had left farming thirty years earlier, and while they still lived on the homestead, Mark worked for an Amish company that converted electric equipment to hydraulic so Amish businesses could use it.

  This time the day before, he had been fishing on Berlin Reservoir with Eli and some others. Barb Raber, a Mennonite woman who often provided taxi service for Eli, had driven them. Barb was a good ten years older than Eli, married and the mother of three, and not nearly as pretty as Eli’s wife. But she had some kind of hold over Eli. He had once worked for Barb’s husband, Ed, in construction. Mark couldn’t help but notice that Eli and Barb seemed to seek out every opportunity to be alone.

  Although Mark had been along on other hunting and fishing trips with both Barb and Eli, he was one of the few in Eli’s circle who didn’t know that Eli had resumed his affair with the taxi lady. Maybe because Eli knew Mark took the Amish life and faith seriously. Their children played together and their wives were good friends.

  There was a lot Mark didn’t know about Eli—but he sure knew when two people acted peculiar.

  “Eli and Barb were talking about something serious,” he recalled sometime later. “They were whispering. They acted sneaky. As if they had something to hide.”

  It was routine for Barb to drive the group to the fishing spot of the day, leave for several hours, and return to take them home. That’s exactly what she did on June 1. Barb hooked up David Yoder’s boat and trailer to her Ford Explorer and drove the Amish men to Berlin Reservoir, an eighteen-mile-long paradise for walleye and bass fishing, powerboating, water-skiing, sailing, Jet Skiing, and windsurfing.

  Eli took his place in the front seat next to Barb. Mark, David Yoder, and David’s son, Norman, sat in the back. When the fishing party stopped for a bite to eat, and when they unloaded and loaded the boat at the public dock, Eli and Barb took the opportunity to huddle and talk in low voices.

  “It was as if they couldn’t wait to be alone,” Mark said.

  He had never seen his friend Eli so nervous.

  “He was very wired up, very on the go, talking a lot, extra uptight,” Mark said. “Something was on his mind.”

  The weather was perfect, but clouds began to roll in by early evening. It started to rain on the drive home. It was late, about 11:00 p.m., by the time Barb dropped Mark and Eli at their homes. Eli had only a few hours before he was to be picked up to go fishing with Steve Chupp and some others. Mark had planned to go, but he’d had to cancel.

  Mark was lost in his work when his sister-in-law phoned. She lived near Eli’s house and could see the ambulance and sheriff’s department cars lining the road. She told Mark she’d just learned that Barbara Weaver had been found dead.

  “I can’t believe it,” he told her. “I had planned to go to Lake Erie, but something came up.”

  Mark immediately phoned Steve.

  “I just wanted to know if you’ve heard the news,” he said.

  Steve had. He told Mark that Firman Yoder had called to say that Barbara was unresponsive. Mark was more candid than the Weavers’ neighbor.

  “She’s dead,” Mark said. “We don’t know why for sure.”

  Eli wouldn’t speak to Firman, but now he grabbed Steve’s phone and fired questions at Mark.

  “How is Barbara?” Eli asked, seeming frantic. “What hospital is she at? What happened?”

  Mark gave Eli the bad news. “She’s not at a hospital, Eli. She died.” He said there were rumors she had been shot.

  “Oh, no!” Eli cried. Mark heard him repeat the words over and over. Eli collapsed, going down on his knees, and crying out that it couldn’t be so.

  Steve, who was right beside Eli, knew Eli sounded as if he was crying, but he saw no tears.

  Steve took the phone back.

  “You have to come back,” Mark told him.

  “We’re on our way,” Steve said.

  The Murphys immediately headed the boat for shore. When they reached the dock, someone suggested that they pause to say a prayer.

  They formed a small circle and prayed for Barbara and Eli.

  Eli’s hands were shaking.

  Back in the Dodge Caravan, Steve connected with a friend at the Apple Creek Fire Department.

  “He said, ‘Prepare for the worst. There’s been no radio talk,’” not a good sign when an ambulance has been sent to the scene.

  Eli told Steve to drive faster.

  The next phone call came from Detective John Chuhi.

  “Where are you, and exactly where is Eli?” the detective asked Steve.

  “We’re on our way back to Maysville,” Steve said. “Eli is right here.”

  “Your next stop is the Justice Center in Wooster,” the detective said. “Do not stop—anywhere.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Okay. Got it.”

  The Dodge Caravan was a gas-guzzler and Steve needed to fuel up. He pulled into a gas station in Ashland. Eli jumped out and disappeared toward the men’s room. Steve glanced over and saw Eli texting.

  A few minutes later they were on their way.

  By the time they reached the Justice Center, the men had agreed that the kind thing to do would be to go in with Eli—not just drop him off to face the news alone.

  “We’re here to support Eli,” Steve told Detective Chuhi, while their friend and fishing pal followed the detective down the hallway for an interview. Steve and the others sat waiting, unsure of what exactly they were waiting for. Would Eli rejoin them and would they take him home?

  While they waited, Mark called again with the news that the deputies on the scene were saying Barbara had been murdered.

  “We put our heads together,” Steve said later. “Red flags went up. We knew Eli was a possible suspect.”

  Detective Chuhi approached the group, alone.

  “This is a homicide,” Chuhi said. “This is a murder and it is under investigation.”

  He asked Steve to stay, but the others could leave. As for Eli, he wouldn’t be going anywhere for a few hours.

  9

  Temptation

  I feel sometimes like all he wants is “his relief.”

  —BARBARA WEAVER, ON ELI’S INSATIABLE NEED FOR SEXUAL GRATIFICATION

  Detectives were anxious to talk to the husband of the murdered woman. Only a few hours had passed since they were called to the murder scene and got an earful about Eli’s double life. It sure sounded like a motive.

  When Eli’s fishing buddies brought Eli to the sheriff’s office, Detective John Chuhi and Lieutenant Kurt Garrison ushered him into an office and read him his Miranda rights. They weren’t too impressed with Eli. This shaggy-haired, unkempt, long-bearded man thought he was God’s gift to women? More important, he seemed oddly apathetic when they told him his wife was dead. Detective Chuhi wrote the following in his report:

  It should be noted during the interview with Eli Weaver that he was found to show very little emotion for someone who learned about losing their wife that morning. When confronted with involvement or knowledge of his wife’s death, he stated a number of times he understood why
we would believe he was involved. Eli also displayed weak denials and had a “casual” attitude during the interview.

  They had Eli walk through the timeline of the last two days. On Monday he had left to go fishing at Berlin Reservoir sometime between 2:30 p.m. and 3:00 p.m., and returned between 11:00 p.m. and 11:30 p.m. Barb Raber had driven him and his friend Mark. When he returned home, Eli did some chores, including feeding deer and putting a horse in a stall. He spoke to his wife, who was in bed, then he showered and went to sleep. He overslept and was awakened by Steve Chupp and David Yoder at about 3:15 a.m. Eli told Chuhi and Garrison that none of the children were awake when he left. He exited the house through the west side basement door and didn’t remember if he locked it.

  The detective asked if he and Barbara had argued that morning. No. What was she wearing? A blue nightgown. Had the couple engaged in sexual conduct before he left? No. When was the last time they did have sex? Sunday afternoon.

  He told them his last conversation with Barbara was as he was dressing. She got out of bed to help him find some clothes. She asked if he had caught any fish Monday and if they’d had fun. The last time he saw his wife she was walking or standing near the bedroom. Harley, Susie, and Lizzie were sleeping on the main floor. Not one to kiss his wife or children good-bye, he simply went down the stairs to the basement and left through the west door.

  The detective asked about the state of his marriage. “It’s fair, and [we are] working to get it better.”

  Eli’s version of his life and the day’s events swung between creative and outright untruthful. He told them that, yes, Firman Yoder had telephoned him on the boat to say they should return home and said only that Barbara was “unresponsive.” Eli said there was another call, from Mark Weaver, telling him Barbara had died of an aneurysm.

  Then they asked about his extramarital affairs. He admitted to having had an affair with a woman named Cherie Lindstrom. He claimed to have confessed the affair to Barbara—only because he had been caught with Cherie—and as far as he knew, his wife had forgiven him. With prompting, he admitted to one other liaison—with Barb Raber, his driver. When he had returned to his family and repented, the bishops had warned him not to see Barb. He did anyway. They had sex several times in January at his house. Were there other affairs? the detectives asked. Eli said no. Did he have any knowledge of or involvement in the death of his wife? No.

  Eli agreed to take a polygraph the next day. What would the result be? he was asked.

  “Truthful,” he said.

  * * *

  TELLING THE TRUTH—and temptation—were problems for Eli. While the Ordnung guides the Amish in everyday life, forbidding the use of electricity and owning a car or a television, there’s another guide for the Amish. Rules of a Godly Life is composed of forty-seven proverbs intended to help the Amish center their daily life on God through their everyday thoughts, words, and deeds. One of those proverbs is Matthew 7:12:

  When you are tempted by others or by your own impulse, to do harm to a fellowman, pause to consider how you would feel if others did so to you. Do nothing to others that you would not wish them to do to you.

  For those more familiar with the Ten Commandments than with the Rules of a Godly Life, Eli had broken just about all of them.

  The world around Eli was changing. Running a business, he was exposed to the facts of life—modern life, that is—and the lures not only unavailable to the Amish, but banned, including phones, the Internet, cars, and extramarital sex. He could have turned to his faith, to his community, and to his wife for support when he felt weak. Other Amish do. Instead, he gave in to his temptations. As detectives were beginning to learn, Eli had coveted a lot more than just his neighbor’s wife. And now his own wife was dead.

  While one of the other detectives stayed with Eli, Detective Chuhi pulled Steve into a room to talk with him.

  Steve said he had arrived at Eli’s house just after 3:00 a.m., but Eli wasn’t up. It took Chupp and another member of the fishing party, David Yoder, both pounding on a door of the house to wake him. Finally a light went on and a few minutes later Eli came outside. They made a stop at Eli’s store to get a fishing license for one of the men, and then the group set off.

  Chupp told detectives that Eli acted strange all morning. They stopped for breakfast and Eli ordered a large meal but barely touched it. At some point, he disappeared into the men’s room for a long time. It was almost as if he was making a secret phone call. Later in the morning, Steve saw Eli searching for his tackle box when all the while it was in his hand. And Eli—who had fishing-trip requirements down to a science—had forgotten to bring a reel for one of the people on the charter. To sum it up, he was distracted.

  They’d arrived at Knot Lost Charters on Lake Erie’s Western Basin, about eighty miles north of Wooster, at about 6:00 a.m. The usual eight-hour-long fishing trip was interrupted by the mid-morning phone call from Firman Yoder.

  Oddest of all, Chupp thought, was that on the drive back, when he told Eli that the police had called and they were to go directly to the Justice Center, Eli didn’t question why.

  Steve was thanked and sent on his way. He stopped by Eli’s house to drop off the jacket and tackle box left in his vehicle.

  The detectives drove Eli to his house. He briefly saw his children. He gave permission for another search of his house, the outbuildings, the barn, and the store. Eli had his hands tested for gun residue, and agreed to give his clothes to detectives for lab testing.

  The detectives wanted to take his clothes into evidence but didn’t want him entering the house. One of the deputies went in and got him a change of clothing and they went to the barn for Eli to strip. Although Eli had worn more contemporary clothes when he lived among the English, he was dressed in traditional Amish garb now. Detectives took every stitch he was wearing, from head to toe, including a blue jacket, blue pants, a blue vest, a white shirt, tan work shoes, men’s underwear, white socks, and a gray sweatshirt. They photographed what Eli had taken on the fishing trip, including a red and white tackle box, two fishing rods, and a plastic bag with a can of pizza-flavored Pringles potato chips, bags of peanuts, other snacks, and a bottle of water. They confiscated the tackle box and a second jacket.

  With his children at their aunt and uncle’s, the detectives drove Eli to his parents’ home in Millersburg. They said they would pick him up the next day to take him to Richfield, in Summit County, to take a polygraph.

  In the meantime, was there a phone number they could reach him at? Apparently not. Eli said he didn’t have a phone.

  They soon learned different.

  Someone tipped off the detectives and gave them Eli’s cell phone number. Maxwell quickly contacted Verizon Wireless to request a preservation notice, which saves the texts sent to and from a phone. Then he met with assistant DA Edna Boyle to get a search warrant to send Verizon. Without those texts, two people might have gotten away with murder.

  * * *

  MARK WEAVER WAS too upset to stay at work. His phone had rung dozens of times since he first got word that Barbara Weaver was dead. He had to get home to Elsie and the children. When he arrived, he joined his family in watching the parade of law enforcement vehicles from his brother-in-law’s house near Eli’s.

  Mark’s phone continued to buzz with friends calling, sharing what they knew and asking what Mark knew. Almost everyone had heard the news. An Amish woman had been killed in her bed as she slept.

  Among the calls Mark received were decidedly peculiar ones from Barb Raber.

  “She was asking questions she shouldn’t have known to ask, like ‘Are they blaming Eli? Was it a shooting? Do they have any other suspects?’”

  Mark spoke to her once—and then quit answering her calls and texts.

  That evening, Mark and his father sat on the porch talking about the horrible death of their friend and neighbor.

  Mark wasn’t suspicious of Eli. He wasn’t even home when it happened. He had been fishing. But he tol
d his father about Barb Raber’s calls and texts.

  “It’s strange, Dad,” he said. “She is asking all these questions, as if she knows something we don’t know. Like ‘Are the police looking at Eli? Do they have other suspects?’ It’s just odd. I quit answering her calls,” Mark said.

  “Let me hear some of the messages,” his father said.

  Mark played a couple of the phone messages and showed him the texts. As they were going through the calls, Mark’s phone rang.

  “It’s her!” Mark said. “It’s Barb Raber.”

  “Answer it,” his father said, “and put her on speakerphone.”

  Mark activated the speaker function on his phone.

  “Hi, Mark. It’s Barb again. I was wondering what you have heard. Where is Eli? Did the police talk to him?”

  “Barb, I don’t know anything.”

  But she was persistent.

  “Do they think Eli killed her? Are they looking for someone else?”

  “There’s nothing new. I’ve got to go.”

  After they hung up, father and son discussed the call. Barb had gone off the deep end. Nothing she said made sense. Mark knew he could depend on his father for advice.

  And he got it.

  “That lady is guilty,” his father said, “and you had better let someone know!”

  * * *

  THE AMISH HOTLINE was burning up.

  Word of mouth was always the preferred way of communicating. But cell phone towers were busy pinging, too.

  Like Mark, Steve was getting lots of calls. He stopped answering the ones from Eli. The messages were always the same: “Steve, this is Eli—call me. I need to talk to you. I’ve got to talk to you!”

  Finally, Steve got a call from a number he didn’t recognize. It was Eli. Eli had a new phone number.

  “I’ve got to ask you—when you woke me up, did you see her, my wife, when you woke me up?”

  “No, I didn’t hear her or see her,” Steve said.

  Pause.

  Click.

  Eli had hung up.

  The day after the murder, Steve and the other members of the fishing group—except Eli—met up to go to breakfast. Eli’s fishing buddies didn’t know they could still be surprised by Eli. But on their way to breakfast they passed a Ford Explorer; it was Barb Raber driving Eli somewhere.