Going strictly by Coroner findings

He performed autopsy 10/31/66 and at 9:23 am determined she has been dead 9-12 hours total, so back to 9:23PM on October 30, to 12:23AM on the 31st(His finding of time stands alone, and is not based on the time change, she died 9-12 hours before no matter whether there was a time change)If we factor the clock turning back, this would make it seem like 10:23PM to 1:23AM

She had also eaten, according to him, her last meal (A supper-type meal)2-4 hours before her death which would be 5:23PM to 7:23PM, or if we figure in time change, 4:23PM to 6:23PM. The time did not change until AFTER Midnight on the 30th, so we need to go with 5:23-7:23PM as time when Cheri likely ate.

In my opinion, eating at around 5:30, and then heading to the library makes sense.

From Rich’s site:

"he knew Cheri Jo Bates and had noticed her in the library the night in question. He said he saw the girl "writing something with a ball point pen in her blue spiral school notebook." The boy told us he was outside about 5:30 pm, waiting for the library to open at 6, and it was then he saw the girl", and a male librarian at the college said he "thought he saw" Cheri Jo Bates in the library that Sunday evening. What makes this crime even more unusual, is that nobody set eyes on the young woman from around the time the library opened at 6:00 pm"

&

"At approximately 9:30 pm, a female student purportedly noticed a man standing in the fateful alleyway smoking a cigarette and exchanged brief greetings with him. She later failed to identify anybody from a photographic line-up, including ‘Bob Barnett’, the prime suspect in the Riverside Police Department investigation""

(The time change didn’t happen yet when these 2 diff witnesses had their sightings)

That makes it possible that Cheri ate at 5:30, went to the library where her friend saw her, then was somehow killed at 9ish. possibly by the unsub smoking the cigarette(who we know is NOT Bill Bennet based on DNA)

To me, if Cheri was alive and well from 6ish to 9pm and was killed after, she had to have willingly spent time with the person that killed her. It is very unlikely she would be abducted and held at gunpoint/knife point for 3 hours either in the alley, or taken away to another location only to be returned alive to RCC and then killed, by some violent predator. If she spent 3 hours with anyone, she likely knew that person and something went wrong at the end of their time together.

I too think she spent those missing hours with her murderer. It was likely somebody she knew, who wanted more than she was prepared to give. The fact her vehicle remained in situ throughout could indicate their presence together occurred in the near locality to the college and was escorted back to her vehicle just prior to 10:30pm, when things turned sour. The fact she suffered a maximum of three stab wounds, with the majority of the wounds lacerations and abrasions to her hands and arms, before the final attack on her neck, negates any notion of a sustained targeting of her body. There were no wounds to her abdomen (nothing below the nipple line). This appears a disorganized attack of an inexperienced killer. Most of the wounds appeared lateral with limited penetration.

The only thing regarding this murder that aligns slightly with the Confession letter, is the typed wording of "Her breast felt very warm and firm under my hands" and "I shall cut off her female parts and deposit them for the whole city to see". The only three wounds on her front torso were all to her breasts.

There was a blood trail extending from the crime scene to Terracina Drive. This should have told us the direction of travel the killer took after the murder, whether from a dripping knife or wound received to the hand of the killer. Cheri Jo Bates had an extremely rare blood group, so I would have hoped this blood was tested to see if it originated from killer or victim. If the blood trail over 100 feet was of uniform separation, this could have indicated a freshly inflicted wound, as opposed to the depreciating volume of blood dripping from a knife.

Not to beat a dead horse but have we ever figured out if she a) still had the notebook she was seen with and b) showed signs of doing work in said notebook?

Also, the books checked out: where were they in the library? And are we sure they were from the main branch?

Answers to these are pretty huge.

In my opinion, eating at around 5:30, and then heading to the library makes sense

The problem is that her father returned to the house at just after 5 and she had already gone and left the note.

There are a few important timeline details I’m hoping you all who are more familiar with this case can clear up. These are things I’ve read in the past:

From what I understand, Cheri Jo was writing a paper on the Electoral college. She earlier made a call to the bank about a missing Bibliography. Bibliographies needed to be typed out in these kind of papers, not hand written. She called a friend and asked her to go with her to the library but her friend declined because she was going on a date. She didn’t make further calls. Her autopsy shows she probably didn’t eat after she left the house and she wasn’t sexually assaulted.

Here are some thoughts I have about those details if correct.

1). If she lost her bibliography, she really needed to do work when she went to the library. She wasn’t just generally studying. With Halloween coming up the next day and both of the following days being religious holidays, if she had parties or mass she wanted to go to she needed to be done that night if the paper was due early the next week.

2). If she wanted to do more than study, why didn’t she tell her friend? Especially if it was a date like thing. You gossip with friends about dates.

3). If she was going to meet a date, why call her friend in the first place?

4). You don’t call a friend to come for 15 minutes while you check out a book. You want company over a good period of time. It tells us Cheri was in the mood to be at least somewhat social. Further, Cheri was well known to be popular and friendly – it would be against her character as described by almost everyone who knew her to go nearly 3 hours without at least saying hello to someone.

5). Wherever she was, she didn’t eat or have sex – two of the things college students regularly slack off to do.

6). If indeed the bibliography needed to be typed, where were typewriters located? Conversely, if it was bibliography work, why would it have taken that long and why did she check out books instead of just copying the info?

In my opinion, eating at around 5:30, and then heading to the library makes sense

The problem is that her father returned to the house at just after 5 and she had already gone and left the note.

They may have just crossed paths or missed each other

In my opinion, eating at around 5:30, and then heading to the library makes sense

The problem is that her father returned to the house at just after 5 and she had already gone and left the note.

They may have just crossed paths or missed each other

This is the problem we just don’t have enough information. I’m sure the police reports could easily clear up the confusion but alas they are not forthcoming.

The fact that she parked directly the entrance on Terracina and not on the parking lot seems to indicate that she planned only a brief visit to the library. At the time of her attack the college had recently employed parking officers to stop students parking on the streets around the quad, this is one of the reasons that the week before fairfax had been closed off for through traffic.

then was somehow killed at 9ish. possibly by the unsub smoking the cigarette(who we know is NOT Bill Bennet based on DNA)

If so how can we account for the screams at 10.30 and the male still being in the vicinity at 9.30 when a witness saw them. ? I’ve said this numerous times but the fact that cars frequently parked feet away from where she was found in someways accounts for her being in that alley. The most direct route from the Library to the place of the attack would not have been by exiting the library through the entrance on Terracina where her car was parked, it would have been to exit that lead directly into the middle of the quad and then past the Little theatre ?

I just thought of something, what if after Cheri checked out her books she went to an empty class
room somewhere in the Quadrangle building complex to work on her paper ?

This would make since because it would have been completely quiet and conducive to concentration
and productivity (I used to do this all the time when I was in college) and she would be near the
library in case she needed more books to finish her paper.

This would explain why nobody saw her in the library as well as the missing time (She could have been
hard at work on her paper and lost track of time then looked up at the clock or her watch and realized
it’s getting very late, perhaps 10 P.M. or so)

Does anyone know if there was easy access to the many classrooms in the building or would it have been
all locked up (accept for the library) ?

In my opinion, eating at around 5:30, and then heading to the library makes sense

The problem is that her father returned to the house at just after 5 and she had already gone and left the note.

They may have just crossed paths or missed each other

This is the problem we just don’t have enough information. I’m sure the police reports could easily clear up the confusion but alas they are not forthcoming.

The fact that she parked directly the entrance on Terracina and not on the parking lot seems to indicate that she planned only a brief visit to the library. At the time of her attack the college had recently employed parking officers to stop students parking on the streets around the quad, this is one of the reasons that the week before fairfax had been closed off for through traffic.

then was somehow killed at 9ish. possibly by the unsub smoking the cigarette(who we know is NOT Bill Bennet based on DNA)

If so how can we account for the screams at 10.30 and the male still being in the vicinity at 9.30 when a witness saw them. ? I’ve said this numerous times but the fact that cars frequently parked feet away from where she was found in someways accounts for her being in that alley. The most direct route from the Library to the place of the attack would not have been by exiting the library through the entrance on Terracina where her car was parked, it would have been to exit that lead directly into the middle of the quad and then past the Little theatre ?

It’s clear, we are missing some piece of the puzzle that is causing us to be off. I saw that someone posted that they did a podcast where a kid near RCC said that his parents made him go to bed extra early to account for the time change. I still wonder if somewhere along the line in some report, on a clock in someone’s home connected to this case, that a time change could have played a role. However, I would think that CA standards for turning time back are the same as in the East coast(I have not looked or researched 1966 standards)that you turn your clock back at 1am, or for most people, when you go to sleep. If that is the case, if someone heard a scream and looked at their clock, and the clock said 10ish, then the time should have really been 10ish, unless they had already set their clock back, then the 10ish on the clock would really be 11PM, etc

Just verified this, so at 2am, the time went back to 1am. (Unless someone went to bed earlier and set it before they went to sleep, and the scream woke them up…if they looked at the clock, it could say 10 but really be 11, etc)

But one of the witnesses time was calculated from what they were watching on the TV when they heard the scream. This leads to no ambiguity in their case as the TV program was on at a set time.

There are a few important timeline details I’m hoping you all who are more familiar with this case can clear up. These are things I’ve read in the past:

From what I understand, Cheri Jo was writing a paper on the Electoral college. She earlier made a call to the bank about a missing Bibliography.

I seriously doubt she spoke to anyone at the Riverside National Bank on a Sunday.

She must have called Donna at her home.

It’s clear, we are missing some piece of the puzzle that is causing us to be off. I saw that someone posted that they did a podcast where a kid near RCC said that his parents made him go to bed extra early to account for the time change. I still wonder if somewhere along the line in some report, on a clock in someone’s home connected to this case, that a time change could have played a role. However, I would think that CA standards for turning time back are the same as in the East coast(I have not looked or researched 1966 standards)that you turn your clock back at 1am, or for most people, when you go to sleep. If that is the case, if someone heard a scream and looked at their clock, and the clock said 10ish, then the time should have really been 10ish, unless they had already set their clock back, then the 10ish on the clock would really be 11PM, etc

In regards to kid near RCC It was TomV who recently was kind enough to repost the information on the Ross Sullivan thread. If we are take the scenario that the clock change explains the discrepancy in 9.30 – 10.30 we are left with three scenarios. (In regards to the sighting on somebody in that alley) :-

1. She was already dead at this point and her body was lying adjacent to said individual.
2. She was still alive and inturn she was not at that location at this time.
3. She was still alive and being held at that location.

1. The man in the alley was hanging around after the attack to smoke a cigarette. The issue with this is that we know that he was wounded but we have no record of any pools of blood where he was reported to be. In fact we have a blood leading from the attack site to Terracina which indicates that he went in that direction immediately after the attack

2. Which means we still have a missing 30 minutes after the library closed, the witness to the POI in the alley would have been able to see her car and thus any trouble she was having starting it but as far as we are aware this was not the case.

3. As there were no signs of a struggle apart from the exact area she was attacked seems to indicate that point 3 is very unlikely, also if the man was seen on his own it would imply that there was a third person (aside from CJB and the man smoking) who was keeping her subdued. ?

Surely the only possible explanation would be that she was elsewhere (location unknown) ? This inturn leads credence to the 10.30 being more likely than 9.30. ?

I’m not sure I got the time change thing, maybe it’s me.
If the coroner stated at 9:23 am she was dead 9-12 hours, and the clock was set back already that morning, wasn’t the real time of the statement 10:23 am?
If so, the correct range for the death is 10:23pm-1:23am.

Also, now assuming the range 9:23-12:23 is correct: 2-4 hours earlier makes 5:23pm-10:23pm, taking into account all the possible combinations.
If so, Chery Jo could have had supper at a conventional hour (say, 8-9pm), after being at the library, in a possibly separate event.