Serial Killers Got Caught in Panama Because They Made Two Fundamental Mistakes

(Panama-Guide) We now know the true identities of the pair of serial killers who have been going by the names of William "Wild Bill" Adolfo Cortez Reese and Jane Seana Cortez. These two set off on a murderous crime spree lasting at least five years. They went on the run from law enforcement officials in the United States, headed South and crossed the border into Mexico, working their way through Belize and Costa Rica before eventually settling down in Panama in late 2007. Their real names are William Dathan Holbert and Laura Michelle Reese. This pair committed their last known crime in the state of Wyoming in the United States on 6 February 2006, when they stole a car. They managed to escape by outrunning the highway patrolman who had stopped them on a routine traffic violation. After that event, the pair apparently made their way south to Mexico. It is suspected they came to Panama and killed the Brown family in the area of Cauchero in Bocas del Toro between 11 November and 12 December 2007. Therefore, authorities will now have to reconstruct their movements and activities between 6 February 2006 and 12 December 2007, a period of one year and ten months. By this time they had developed a "modus operandi" which was working for them to a certain extent. They would take over a property which they really didn't own, and then sell that property to some unsuspecting sucker at a greatly reduced price, saying they just wanted to get rid of the property in a hurry. They would take the money and move on quickly, before authorities could catch up with them, However, once they arrived in Panama they made two fundamental mistakes which led to their eventual arrest. These people are now wearing handcuffs, and before too long they will be tried, convicted, and sentenced to the maximum penalties allows under Panamanian law. By the time the Panamanians are done with them they will be in their late 60's, when they will be extradited back to the United States where they will be tried and convicted to prison sentences there - so they can die in prison. Their long murderous run of crime and violence is over.

 They Stopped Moving: If Holbert and Reese had come to Panama, killed the Brown family, stayed for about eight to twelve months, and then sold the property and moved on, then no one would have ever known who they really are or what they were doing. As long as they committed a crime, cashed out their chips and stayed on the move, local authorities could never catch up with them. By staying in Panama from at least December 2007 until June 2010 - a period of two years and six months - they gave the people in Bocas del Toro enough time to realize there was simply "something wrong" with these two. When first Bo Icelar and then Cheryl Lynn Hughes went missing, and the last contact both of them had was with Holbert and Reese, their goose was effectively cooked. They tried to get back on the move as fast as possible but by them it was too late.

Complaint Never Passed To Public Ministry: When I first started investigating the death of Bo Icelar I was told someone had supposedly filed a missing persons complaint with the Department of Judicial Investigation (DIJ) in the province of Bocas del Toro in Panama. I asked them to send me a copy of that complaint, but I never received it. I just spoke to the prosecutor in Bocas del Toro and he confirmed that, in fact, they had received a report of a missing person on Bo Icelar. However in Panama complaints and reports are filed with the DIJ, which is the Panamanian version of the FBI. They conduct their investigation and when they have enough information they forward the case file to the office of the local prosecutor, who has greater powers to do things like issue search warrants, issue arrest orders, gather evidence, etc. Even though the DIJ in Panama received the report of the disappearance of Bo Icelar, probably in December 2009, by 12 July 2010, fully seven months later, the prosecutor in Bocas del Toro still didn't know anything about the report. The DIJ had never really investigated the case, and they never forwarded the meager information they had to the prosecutor's office. The terrible and sad fact of the matter is that if the DIJ had done their job on the disappearance of Bo Icelar in an efficient manner, then Holbert and Reese might not have had the freedom of movement which allowed them to eventually murder Cheryl Lynn Hughes. If there was ever a case of investigative "malpractice" - this is it.

Hard Break Between Agencies: Every prosecutor in Panama works for the Public Ministry. The Chief of the Public Ministry is the Attorney General of the Republic, Giuseppe Bonissi. The primary mission of the Public Ministry is to first investigate and then prosecute crimes committed in the country. The Public Ministry does not (in theory) work for or answer directly to the President of the Republic. With the case of the removal of former Attorney General Ana Matilde Gomez we all know there are political cross-overs between the Executive branch and the public ministry, but the point I'm trying to make is that there is a "hard break" between the Public Ministry and the National Police, who do in fact work for and under the Executive Branch of government. The Department of Judicial Investigation works for and under Gustavo Perez, who is the Chief of the National Police, so they respond to him. He works for José Raúl Mulino, the Minister of Public Security. And obviously as a cabinet member, Mulino works directly for Panamanian president Ricardo Martinelli. So, the investigators at the sleepy little DIJ office on Isla Colon in Bocas del Toro had received the missing persons report on Bo Icelar in December 2009, but that information was never passed - through the hard break - to the office of the "Personeria" (prosecutor) which is located in town, near the police station, about five minutes away on foot.

The Public Ministry Had No Idea: When I first approached the Public Ministry on 7 July 2010 I went straight to the top. I had spent about a week doing my own investigation into the disappearances of Bo Icelar and Cher Hughes and by that morning I was completely convinced that Holbert and Reese had killed them in order to steal their property and belongings. I had a stack of papers - a file containing photos of the victims as well as photos of the suspects, files I had pulled from the Panamanian "Registro Publico" (Public Registry) on the companies and properties that were owned by Brown, Icelar, and Hughes but which were now in the name of "Cortez", as well as my notes from conversations I had with friends and family members of the victims. Although I didn't have an appointment I simply went to the office of the Attorney General and said "I've got some critically important information on the murder of Americans in Bocas del Toro that you people need to know about, and to investigate." It took them awhile to figure out how they wanted to handle this. First I was going to speak directly to the Attorney General. Then I was going to speak with the General Secretary. Then I was bounced back across the hall and was told I would be meeting with the Assistant to the Attorney General, Neftalí Jaén. However, his schedule was full and he had other appointments already scheduled, and if I wanted to wait then eventually he would talk to me. So, sat there and waited for two hours, mostly making small talk with the secretary about "who has the best ceviche in Panama..." because neither of us had had a chance to eat lunch and we were starving.

Getting Your Head Around It: When someone walks into your office and drops a load of documents supposedly exposing a pair of serial killers, it's understandable that it might take awhile to get your head around the information. Neftalí Jaén listened very intently, asked several questions, and clarified many details until he understood what was going on. At the end of that meeting he promised to call the Director of the DIJ, Javier Carrillo and to pass the information I had given him to investigators. That was the first time anyone in the Public Ministry, either in Panama City or in Bocas del Toro or anywhere else, had any idea that these crimes had been committed. By this point the DIJ had missing persons reports on both Bo Icelar and Cheryl Lynn Hughes but they had never passed that information to the prosecutors of the Public Ministry.

Cher's Relatives Fly to Panama: That weekend Cher's Aunt and Sister flew to Panama, and Cher's husband flew to Panama City from Bocas del Toro. I picked them up at their hotel early Monday morning, 12 July 2010, and took them directly to the office of Neftalí Jaén. In Panama there are strict rules and dress codes for public offices. Men are not allowed to enter a public office - such as the offices of the Attorney General - if they are wearing shorts. And of course in Bocas del Toro no one ever wears long pants, it's short and flip-flops all day long, all the time. This detail of the short and long pants thing for men totally slipped my mind. When we got there, they simply refused to allow Keith to go upstairs. When we go in to meet with Neftalí Jaén we asked him again to please allow Keith to come upstairs to participate in the meeting, to make an exception to the rule. The answer was no, so we pressed on without him. Cher's Aunt and Sister basically reiterated the information I had presented earlier, explained how they strongly suspected Holbert and Reese (then known as Cortez) had killed Cher, and they asked for help. After that meeting was over, Neftalí Jaén went downstairs to the entryway and spoke personally to Keith, and also gave him is assurances that they would look into the case more energetically. From there I took them to the DIJ where they filed their complaints. Their actions on this day, filing those complaints and talking to the authorities, is what really got the ball rolling on the investigation.

Cher Was Different: For the life of me, I can't figure out how Holbert and Reese thought they could get away with killing Cher Hughes. Everyone in town knew her, and she was well liked and respected. She had family members, both in Bocas del Toro in Panama as well as a large family back in the United States. If you look at the basic fundamental elements of Cher Hughes and compare her to the rest of the known victims, she stands out as different. The Brown family were practically reclusive - he would send others to town to buy groceries and run errands for him, for example. Bo Icelar was not part of the "partying crowd" of English speaking expatriates in Bocas del Toro. He didn't drink, he pretty much kept to himself, kept a relatively low profile, and didn't have any family members in Bocas del Toro. The other two victims were local workers - in Panamanian Spanish called "indigenous" persons or "Indians" in English by the gringos in Panama - and it's an unfortunate fact of life in Panama that these people might be missing, but the authorities would spend even less time and effort on them than you would a missing foreigner. And, we all know how that turned out. Cher Hughes, on the other hand, was everywhere. She was on the "party circuit." She had many people who worked for her. She lived in Bocas for years. She worked with the charities and helped the local children. Holbert and Reese would have been hard pressed to pick a higher profile victim. And I think that killing her was what led to their eventual arrest and what brought and end to their reign of terror.

If It's Any Consolation: Cher's friends and family members can rest, to some degree, on the knowledge that her death helped lead to the arrest and eventual conviction of these two animals. Her sacrifice led directly to their capture, arrest, and eventual conviction on multiple murder charges. Holbert and Reese are now completely "unmasked" - and they will never kill anyone ever again. If it hadn't gone down the way it did, then I feel strongly Holbert and Reese would have eventually killed others in the future. Anyway, at least that's something...

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Original Source: http://www.panama-guide.com/article.php/20100728091601406 
Date Retrieved: July 28, 2010.