Bail Kept At $3 Million For Bednarz, Charged In 2010 Thanksgiving Killing Of His Mother, Two Others [The Hartford Courant]

Oct. 17--MANCHESTER -- The warrant for Brett D. Bednarz's arrest on charges that he murdered his mother and two of her friends in East Hartford nearly two years ago describes a long police investigation during which detectives worked to link their person of interest in the killings to the evidence they recovered at the bloody crime scene.

Among the possible links police discovered were a crumpled, bloodstained tissue that contained the DNA of Bednarz and one of the people he's accused of killing; and bloody sock prints that, experts said, came from someone with Bednarz's size 13 feet, the arrest warrant says.

Bednarz, 48, was dressed in blue jeans and a camouflage shirt during his brief appearance before Judge Carl Taylor at his arraignment Tuesday in Superior Court in Manchester. He did not enter a plea.

His lawyer, Bethany Phillips of the Hartford law firm Butler, Norris & Gold, urged the judge to lower Bednarz's bail. She said Bednarz has known police suspected him since the killings and has not fled. Further, he left the country for a vacation and returned, she said.

Taylor left bail at $3 million and ordered Bednarz back to court Oct. 30 in Hartford.

Bednarz is charged with three counts of murder, home invasion, first-degree burglary, criminal violation of a protective order and capital felony, the state's death penalty statute, in the killings of Beverly Therrien, 74; Michael Ramsey, 53; and Pamela Johns, 60. The three were found dead on Thanksgiving 2010 in Therrien's home at 154 Naomi Drive.

Prosecutors could pursue the death penalty against Bednarz if he is convicted because the crimes occurred before Connecticut abolished the death penalty.

Among those in the audience was Candace Bednarz, who sobbed as her shackled brother was led into the courtroom by judicial marshals. Before leaving the courthouse, she covered her face with a scarf and refused to answer reporters' questions.

Bednarz had lived with his mother on Naomi Drive, but he moved out after he was ordered by a judge to have no contact with her after being convicted of assaulting her.

Brett Bednarz was arrested on May 11, 2010, for assaulting Therrien and a protective order was issued. He apparently moved into his sister's apartment at in Manchester, the arrest warrant said, adding that a month later Therrien began to see domestic violence caseworkers. She told them her son had beat her on numerous occasions and that he had sexually assaulted her. She also told the caseworkers that Bednarz pushed her, causing her to fall over a box and fracture her hip. She provided them with X-rays.

Therrien wrote a letter dated Oct. 10, 2010, to prosecutors in Manchester expressing her fear of her son. "I lay here night after night wondering if Brett will come back here to hurt me again." He was found guilty Oct. 26 and ordered to stay away from her for 20 years.

In a conversation with a court clerk in Manchester, Therrien said "she felt Brett Bednarz would kill her," according to the arrest warrant.

Therrien was found dead in a bathroom in her home on Nov. 25, 2010, sitting upright against the bathtub, with traumatic wounds to her head. Ramsey's body was lying across Therrien's legs. He had cuts on his arms and hands -- defensive wounds, police said -- and similar wounds to his head.

Johns' body was found in the hallway. She too had a wound to her head.

Police also recovered bloody, crumpled toilet tissue from a doorway leading to a bedroom. Ramsey's DNA was found in the blood, and Bednarz's DNA was found in "stiff yellowish stains" inside the tissue, according to the warrant.

Detectives also found bloody sock prints in several locations that investigators found to be consistent with Bednarz's size 13 foot.

The victims were dressed in pajamas or bed clothing when they were killed, suggesting the killings occurred at night.

Police said Therrien's house was ransacked.Among the papers disturbed were financial records, including a letter to Therrien from her life insurance company thanking her for her recent request to change the beneficiary of her policy, police said.

According to search warrants, Therrien sought to remove Bednarz as beneficiary. Because of her violent death shortly after requesting the change, her life insurance company did not honor the request, and Brett Bednarz remains beneficiary.</p>

Another relative of Therrien told police that Therrien had told her she had an appointment on Dec. 1, 2010, to meet with a lawyer about changing the beneficiary of her will from Bednarz to her niece and nephew. Investigators never found a will and none was filed with East Hartford's probate court.

Police found evidence to suggest the assailant left Therrien's home and headed through woods to Jessica Drive. A Jessica Drive resident told police that three weeks before the killings he saw a man about 6 feet tall get out of a white Nissan Altima and head into the woods toward Naomi Drive. Another neighbor saw the same vehicle and noted it had tinted windows.

Bednarz's niece, Tiffanie Ortiz, has a white 2006 Nissan Altima with tinted windows that Bednarz used regularly, according to the arrest and search warrants. Ortiz lives with Candace and Brett Bednarz at an apartment at 114 Rachel Drive in Manchester, according to search warrants.

When police went to that apartment on Nov. 25, 2010, to inform Candace and Brett Bednarz of their mother's death, Candace Bednarz was "visibly upset," according to the warrant, while "Brett Bednarz was cordial and did not appear upset." He described the two people living with his mother as "homeless Michael and Pam." He also refused to answer questions about his mother's killing without his lawyer present.

While talking to Bednarz, East Hartford detectives noticed "a few small fresh cuts" on his left hand and later that day obtained a search warrant to examine Brett Bednarz's body for injuries.

The examination revealed a small scab on Brett Bednarz's right ankle, a small reddish bruise on the front of his right ankle, a scratch on the side of his right forearm, small cuts on the back of his left hand index and middle fingers, scuffed skin on three of his right hand knuckles, and a red swollen toe on his right foot.

Bednarz told police he suffered the cuts and scratches while doing electrical work at his sister's apartment, according to the warrant. He told police he stubbed his toe at her apartment.

Months later, a podiatrist told police that the bloody sock smears found at the crime scene showed "repeated rotational smear of the great toe imprint" on the right foot, indicative of someone with limited motion in their right foot.

On Dec. 1, 2010, police went to the Rachel Drive apartment with a search warrant. They found a copy of a note that corresponded with a tip they'd received months earlier from one of Therrien's neighbors. That neighbor told police she'd found a note on her car around Sept. 16 blaming Therrien for Bednarz's father's death. Andrew Bednarz died Sept. 15. She threw away the note.

The note police found in the Bednarz's apartment "appeared to be a copy of the note described by the resident," the warrant states.

It said, among other things, that Therrien "has to be stopped" and "she made all our lives a living hell," according to the arrest warrant.

The note also had the passage, "Don't worry, I have an ace up my sleeve. I'm jus (sic) waiting to use it. Karma can be a [expletive]." The note also asked the Naomi Drive resident to "monitor activity at 154 Naomi Drive and to call him if she saw anything." At the bottom of the note was typed "Brett," according to the warrant.

In January 2011, Bednarz pleaded guilty to possession of a small amount of marijuana and was sentenced to six months in prison. Two inmates at the MacDougall Correctional Institute in Suffield told police that they'd talked to Bednarz while they were housed in the same cellblock.

One said Bednarz asked him if he was aware of the "thing" that happened on Thanksgiving. "Bednarz continued by saying that the police did not have enough evidence to arrest him," the inmate told detectives. Bednarz said he "was the one who killed those three people," the inmate told detectives, according to the search warrant.

Another inmate told police that Bednarz asked him if he'd heard of the triple murder on Thanksgiving, according to the warrant. When the inmate said he had, Bednarz replied, "That was me. I did that," according to the warrant.

David Bednarz was in court Tuesday to see his half-brother's arraignment. He said the court appearance was the first time he'd seen Candace Bednarz show emotion since his stepmother was killed.

A friend of the victims, Howard Fair of West Hartford, said outside court that Brett Bednarz's arrest "was long overdue."

Fair said he met Ramsey and Johns through his girlfriend. Ramsey used to volunteer at a Hartford homeless shelter, he said.

Ramsey was a witty person, he said -- different from Johns, who he called stoic.

Ramsey wasn't someone who would pose a threat to anyone, Fair said. "He was like a little puppy dog," he said.

He met Beverly Therrien when she asked him to help Ramsey and Johns move in with her.

"I had moved them in, and I seriously regretted it," Fair said.

He described Therrien as "free-spirited" and said, "She didn't take nonsense."

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