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Murder of Taylor Behl

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Taylor Behl
Born
Taylor Marie Behl

(1987-10-13)October 13, 1987
Vienna, Virginia
DiedSeptember 6, 2005(2005-09-06) (aged 17)
Body discoveredMathews County, Virginia
Burial placeUnion Cemetery
Leesburg, Loudoun County, Virginia, U.S.
Known forMurder victim

Taylor Marie Behl (/biːl/; October 13, 1987 – September 6, 2005) was a 17-year-old college freshman from Vienna, Virginia. She moved to Richmond, Virginia, in August 2005 to attend Virginia Commonwealth University. About two weeks later on Labor Day, September 5, 2005, Behl disappeared. Acting on a tip one month later, VCU police located her remains at a rural area in Mathews County, Virginia. The case was an Internet cause célèbre.[1][2][3]

Case

In the early morning of Saturday, September 17, 2005, Behl's car was found about a mile and a half from the VCU Campus. A tracking dog led police to Jesse Schultz, 22, who lived in the area where Behl's car was found; Schultz was eventually cleared. Police also questioned a former boyfriend of Behl with whom she had dinner on September 5, and other acquaintances.

Another of the last individuals to have seen Behl alive was Benjamin Fawley, a 38-year-old amateur photographer and self-described "Goth/skater from the 1980s." Fawley's alibi could not be confirmed, and after executing a search warrant[specify] police arrested him on September 23 for 16 counts of child pornography.

A surveillance video showed Behl and Fawley leaving Behl's dormitory together on the night she disappeared.[4] According to police, Fawley told them Behl died accidentally during a consensual sex act (likely erotic asphyxiation) with him in her car at Mathews County, Virginia. He claimed he then panicked and dumped her unburied body in a ravine.

Behl's mother Janet Pelasara called Fawley "a big, fat liar" and claimed that Behl had sex "once out of curiosity" with Fawley in April 2005, "and then didn't want anything to do with him."[1] In August 2006, Fawley's Alford plea to second degree murder was accepted and he was sentenced to thirty years in prison.[5]

Use of internet

In September 2007, Chuck Cohen, a first sergeant with the Indiana State Police, told a class of 21 law enforcement agencies studying "how criminals often leave an online trail at social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook" that the Taylor Behl case marked one of the first times that police narrowed down their suspect pool using a MySpace friends list. Cohen said that Fawley's Internet footprint eventually led police to Behl's body.[6]

See also

References

  1. ^ Layton, Lyndsey (October 16, 2005). "Police Told Death an Accident, Lawyer Says" – via www.washingtonpost.com.
  1. ^ Participate.net[failed verification]
  2. ^ Washington Post
  3. ^ Times Dispatch
  4. ^ Richmond Times Dispatch
  5. ^ TimesDispatch.com Charge amended against Fawley
  6. ^ VCU Gladding Residence Center Surveillance Cam Footage
  7. ^ "Social networking sites prove to be good investigative tool." Baton Rouge, La. Morning Advocate, Sunday, September 2, 2007
  8. ^ 30-Year Sentence In Slaying Of Student Washington Post, Thursday, August 10, 2006; Page B01
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