Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Thank you.
What is going on, true crime fans? I'm your host, Heath. And I'm your host, Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello, everybody. Welcome to the show. What do I usually say? I don't know. I hope you're doing well, guys. Sometimes we don't really have, you know, intros to this show. We're like, what are we about to say? No, but today's case, it's very...
There's a lot of layers to it. It is a crazy story. This one takes place in Pennsylvania. Yeah, and not to spoil today's episode, but this has a lot of similarities to the Michael Peterson case. If you guys watch The Staircase or know anything about that case, yeah, it's pretty close. I could have sworn we covered it, and I'm trying to quickly pull it up on my phone, and I can't figure out where we covered that. Was it a bonus episode?
I think it probably was a real crime episode because of the staircase. Right, yeah. True. Yeah, and not to spoil it, but you guys will probably think that yourselves as well as we start getting into the night that Jan passed and what was happening right before it. It really is so similar to Kathleen Peterson's murder that happened just a few years earlier. Well, let's not waste any more time. Let's get into today's story.
All right, guys, this is episode 421 of Going West. So let's get into it. It's that time of the year. Your vacation is coming up.
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In July of 2008, a 45-year-old woman was found dead in the swimming pool of her rural Pennsylvania home, having been savagely beaten and strangled. Between an unusual call to 911 and a computer chock full of motive to murder, police narrowed in on a suspect fast. This is the story of Jan Roseborough.
Jan Elizabeth Binkley was born on July 2nd, 1963 to parents Evelyn and Samuel Binkley, and she grew up alongside a sister named Susie and a brother named Brian.
Jan spent most of her life in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. And for those who don't know, Lancaster County encompasses nearly a thousand square miles or over 1600 kilometers of super picturesque farmlands and sprawling communities, which are home to over 500,000 residents. But it's probably most well known for its large Amish settlement. Yeah, I've actually been to this county once.
I went to Intercourse, Pennsylvania, which is the funniest name ever. Wait, didn't you go to like an Amish restaurant or something? I did. Yeah. I went to like this Amish restaurant where basically it's like a restaurant. You could kind of call it a restaurant. It basically was. But yeah, you would go and you would sit down at this large table with like random people that you didn't know. And all the food was shareables. So they would bring out like a big bowl of like mashed potatoes.
It was really interesting. Pretty cool place. Love it. So yeah, this is where Jan grew up and she attended Cocalico High School, graduating in 1981 and continued on to enroll in the prestigious Penn State University. So she wanted to stay locally and she did. It's only about a couple hours away from where she lived. She graduated from Penn State in 1985 and spent time working in a card shop before becoming a branch manager for a Fulton Bank.
Jan was always very involved in her church, her community, and a bunch of different charitable organizations. And she's remembered as an extremely selfless person. She's described as kind, gentle, and generous. And it was in Jan's small town of just over 2,000 people where she met her future husband, Michael Roseborough. Wait, did you say in the intro that his name is also Michael?
I didn't say that, but that's another similarity here. Lots of Michaels, lots of Petersons. So they actually went to high school together, but according to Michaels' mom, their families knew each other for many years because of how tight-knit the community was and because Michaels' family owned a successful funeral home in Denver, Pennsylvania, which is located just a few minutes up the road from where Jan grew up in Reinhold. So a lot of people knew this family.
Roseboro Funeral Home had been in operation for decades, opened by Michael's great-grandfather, and when Michael was a junior in high school, he announced to his family that he wanted to take over the family business, which he started transitioning into doing when he graduated. Like Jan, Michael was very well-liked by all who knew him. He was described as empathetic, gregarious, and a friend to everyone.
His mom remembered how caring and compassionate he was with clients, which is obviously super important with that job, you know, at a funeral home. Yeah, you have to talk to grieving people. Yeah, absolutely. And how respected and beloved he was in the community. So Jan and Michael got married on May 7th, 1989, and they went on to have four children together. They
They settled into a beautiful, sprawling home situated on three acres in Reinholds, which happened to belong to Jan's family, actually. And according to neighbors and friends, the couple were constantly making additions to and updating on the home, you know, just making it an ideal place to raise their expanding family. And the property even included a large patio and a pool in the backyard. So they had everything they needed there.
Well, let's cut to years later. You know, their kids are growing up, but sadly on May 6, 2008, Jan's mother, Evelyn, passed away, five years after her father, Samuel, did. So, by the summer of 2008, Jan had lost both of her parents.
And just the day after her mom passed, on May 7th, 2008, was Jan and Michael's 19th wedding anniversary. And other than the devastating loss of Evelyn, things seemed to be going really well with this family. Well, let's cut forward a bit to a couple more months. So, on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008, it was a quiet summer night at the Roseboro's home.
17-year-old Samuel was at a friend's house, and the three younger children, aged 6, 9, and 12, were asleep inside their sprawling Pennsylvania home. Michael would later explain that he went to bed around 9.30 p.m., leaving his wife outside by herself.
Just over an hour later, around 11 at night, Michael claims that he looked out the window of their bedroom and noticed that the pool lights were still turned on and the tiki torches that adorned the backyard were still lit. So about an hour and a half after he goes to bed, he sees that, you know, his wife is likely still outside. Yeah, exactly. Now, he claims that he went outside to turn them off, and that's when he noticed his wife floating motionless in the pool.
So, it's dark outside, but he can see the silhouette of her body against the pool lights. Then he placed a call to 911, and here's a clip from that call.
Okay, is she breathing? No, she's not. Is she still in the water? No, I pulled her out.
Okay, do you want to try to start CPR on her? I will, yeah. Okay, do you need help to do that? I can give you instructions on what to do. I would like to guard you, I know. Right, I can walk you through it if you want help. I want to get her out of the pool. What's that? I want to get her out of the pool. She's still in the pool? Yeah.
I thought you said she was out of the pool. Oh my God, I'm sorry, she's out of the pool. Help me through this, please. Okay, so she is out of the pool? Yes. Okay, what I want you to do, is there anybody else there? My children are asleep. How old are your children? Twelve, nine, and six. Okay. What we need to do is get her on her back. Yes, sir. Okay, you have her flipped over onto her back? She's on her back, yes. Okay, I want you to check and see if she has a pulse. Do you know how to do that? I do. Okay.
There is no pulse. There is none? There is none. What we're going to do is we're going to start the CPR, okay? Okay. Keep her head tilted back, pinch her nose closed. Cover her mouth with yours and give her two deep regular breaths, about one second each. Okay.
Is that the siren for the fire department there? Yeah. Okay. Hold on. Hold on. Okay. Sorry. Okay, that's fine. Is there somebody there? Not yet, no. Okay. What we're going to do is we're going to start the compressions, okay? Go ahead and put your hand on her chest. I want you to pump her chest hard and fast about 30 times, about twice a second. Okay. Okay, but the chest come up all the way between pumps.
And let me know when you've done it 30 times, okay? Okay. All right, go ahead and do that. All right. 13 seconds passes. Okay. You did it about 30 times? Yes, sir. Okay. Go ahead and look in her mouth and see if there's anything in there. Okay. Okay.
I mean, no emotion, no sense of urgency. And he can't figure out if she's in the pool or out of the pool. At first he says she's out of the pool. Then he says, I want to get her out of the pool. And then the operator is like, wait, I thought you said she was out of the pool. And then he's like, yeah, sorry. She's out of the pool.
And I think it's just so disturbing to me how casual this guy is. I mean, casual Carl over here has zero emotion in his voice. He basically does not seem...
Like, he's in a hurry to do the CPR. Yeah, to try to save her life. Right, yeah. Like, he's more concerned about other things at this point. Well, and also he says that he was a lifeguard. Like, oh, yeah, I know how to do CPR. I was a lifeguard, I know. And then, you know, the operator's like...
Are you sure? Like, I can walk you through it. And then he says, yeah, walk me through it. Like, he's never done it. And, you know, you could argue that he was in shock. He's forgetting. It was a long time ago that he was a lifeguard. Probably when he was a teenager. But that's such a cocky response to be like, yeah, like, I was a lifeguard. I know. You know what I mean? Like, it's just like, shut up. Yeah. And then...
Yeah, there's just a lot of back and forth here with him. Again, you could say that he's in shock. Maybe that's why he's so calm because he's in shock too. He can't believe it, but it's definitely a weird call. Yeah. So a police cruiser arrived on the scene first and hooked Jan up to an AED or an automated external defibrillator in hopes of jumpstarting her heart. Because remember...
According to Michael, she doesn't have a pulse. Right. But when the machine advised them against continuing use, the paramedics arrived and continued CPR.
Now, strangely, while his wife lay dying and his world should have been falling apart around him, paramedics noticed that Michael was flat and calm, obviously like you guys could hear, and removed himself to smoke a cigarette and talk to somebody on the phone. Again, that's not too weird. You're having a cigarette to calm down. Maybe you're calling family, right? But a lot of people have looked down at this. Now,
When asked by the responding deputy, Mike Firestone, so when I say Mike, I'm not talking about Michael. I'm talking about the deputy. We'll just call the deputy Mike. Yeah, Mike, and then Michael is the husband. So when asked by responding deputy, Mike Firestone, what had happened to his wife that night, Michael explained as follows. Quote, I went to bed at approximately 10 o'clock, but Jan stayed outside in the pool area to watch the night sky.
I was inside sleeping when I got up to go to the bathroom and noticed that the pool lights and outside torches were still lit. When I entered the pool area, I noticed my wife in the deep end of the pool, retrieved a telephone and immediately called 911. The operator advised me how to perform CPR, which I did until everyone arrived.
Now, the deputy officer, again, Mike, then asked if he and Jan had been drinking, to which Michael responded that he had, but she had not. And this officer did later note that he could smell the alcohol on Michael's breath. So it was clear that that part was true. Right. He wasn't lying about that part.
So Michael claimed that he had been swimming earlier, but that Jan hadn't been. And this is really weird. I think this will be weird to you, Heath, because you swim a lot. He actually went to bed in wet swim trunks. So he's saying, I was swimming, then I decided to go to sleep, and he fell asleep in his soaking wet swim trunks.
and then woke up, saw that the lights were still on outside, went outside, and then saw his wife, Jan, called 911. When they arrived, he's still in those swim trunks. Okay, this is probably the weirdest thing to me because nobody can corroborate the fact that he went to bed when he said he did. But the fact that he's standing there wearing these wet swimming trunks and claims that he was in bed in his wet swimming trunks...
Why would you do that? That's just... Yeah, like, that's the most uncomfortable thing. It's not healthy. Like, laying in your bed in wet shorts. I mean, you've never even done that, have you? I have been plastered drunk out of my mind after swimming in the pool and have never...
gotten into bed in wet swimming trunks. Very true. So as Jan was taken to the hospital, Michael walked away from the scene, lit a second cigarette and made another phone call with no questions as to his wife Jan's status, by the way, or where she was being taken. He's not
He's not asking any questions at all. Yeah, how does that happen?
Well, Mike Firestone stayed behind to survey the scene and noted that there were no obvious signs of a struggle outside. The only items that were out of place were Jan's cell phone, covered in a red case, and reading glasses, along with two landscaping stones that had fallen to the bottom of the pool.
However, Mike did note a bucket of cleaning solution with a washcloth inside, still positioned near the pool. Weird. Yeah, kind of suspicious. So after being taken in, barely clinging to life, 45-year-old Jan was pronounced dead at the hospital. Michael was still at their Reinhold's home waiting for his family to arrive as well as Jan's siblings.
Michael was brought in for questioning immediately, and the detective who questioned him noted that his lip was bleeding and he had scratches on his face. Which is something we see so frequently and it's never a good sign. Absolutely not. So during the search of the house, detectives found areas where bleach had been used.
and suspected the possibility that the area had been hastily cleaned before their arrival. Which obviously, you know, wouldn't make sense if this really was just an accidental death.
But as Don broke over the pool that Michael claims took the life of his wife and the mother of his children, a torrential downpour drenched the patio and yard, wiping clean most remnants of evidence. So this was obviously not a good thing for investigators. True, but they had a lot coming for them when they would do this autopsy. Absolutely, they did. Because when Jan's body was brought in for examination, the doctor was shocked to see blood in a drowning death.
In fact, her head wound was so deep that the doctor initially questioned if it had been from a bullet.
After the autopsy, the medical examiner, whose name was Dr. Wayne Ross, concluded that whoever had committed this attack had done it in a way that the results wouldn't be obvious. Because, shockingly, her autopsy revealed that she hadn't only drowned like Michael alleged, and like authorities had assumed, she had been beaten mercilessly before being strangled and
in what Dr. Ross described as a carotid chokehold, and then tossed in the pool, where she drowned from the combination of her injuries and also water intake. In an interview, Dr. Ross explained, quote,
I can compress the left side and the right side at the exact same time, and it takes seconds for somebody to go out. And the bruises are in the back, almost as if it were hidden. That told me that she had been beaten, she had been bludgeoned, and she had been hit about her head numerous times. Numerous times. The cause of death was multiple traumatic injuries, and that was a combination of strangulation, blunt force trauma to the head, as well as drowning.
So this wasn't even a case of her hitting her head on something and then falling into the pool and drowning. It was obvious that someone else was involved here. Had to have been, obviously. You know, it's not like she's going to strangle herself, you know, and jump in the pool.
Well, when Michael was informed of this, he seemed neither concerned nor fazed. He didn't seem worried about the future safety of his children. You know, the fact that there was a murderer in their backyard, he's not thinking about that. He's not, you know, worried about solving the murder of his wife. But his friends and family explained away any apathetic behavior in the days following his wife's death.
as due to his training in the funeral director industry and that he was accustomed to seeing death and grief. Well, didn't we just talk about earlier about, you know, how he was supposed to be this extremely empathetic person
because of his job. He has to talk to grieving people all the time. So it's weird that they're now explaining it the opposite way. Yeah, like because he sees this, he's unfazed. But it's like, even if that were true, this is your wife. You know, we heard on that call, he was giving her CPR and he told the operator to give him a minute because, or give him a second because he had to go throw up. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, there's that too.
So of course, all of this aside, because he is the husband of the victim, Michael fell under scrutiny. And this really happened the day after Jan's murder when police received an anonymous tip
Bombshell. Massive bombshell. So the woman in question was Angela Funk, a 38-year-old married mother of two. And she lived very close to the Roseboro funeral home. And after she and Michael crossed paths multiple times, they eventually met up for coffee.
Now, what started as mostly innocent flirtation blossomed into a full-blown affair on May 29th, 2008, which was the first time that the couple slept together. And as you can probably remember from the beginning of this episode, this came just weeks after Jan lost her mom and she and Michael celebrated nearly 20 years of marriage. And, of course, this is less than two months before Jan is murdered. Horrible.
So juggling six children between them and, of course, both still married to other people, they, of course, didn't have very much time for dating. But they would meet at an apartment that her mother owned in Mount Joy, which is about 35 minutes southwest of where Angela lived in the small borough of Denver, Pennsylvania, which, again, is where Michael's business is. Exactly. Exactly.
So she also admitted that they made use of Michael's funeral home multiple times. Uh, ew. Yeah, that's so horrible. That is like the last place that a person would be turned on. I mean, it makes sense in a way because this is a place where they can kind of be alone, but it's very...
creepy to think about. God, it just gives me like icky vibes. I feel the same way. So sometimes they would also meet for dates at the local history museum. And then once they met up at a Costco just to be together because they're trying to say, oh, you know, I have a little bit of time here. I have a little bit of time here. Let's meet here because they both have such busy lives, but they're trying to make this affair work for them.
So although their relationship was very new, Angela describes feeling smitten early on and their conversations quickly became serious and focused on the future. So yeah, things are moving very quickly again considering they started seeing each other just two months before Jan was murdered.
Now, Michael and Angela called each other over 1,400 times between when they started seeing each other and when Jan was killed. And they also exchanged hundreds of emails and text messages. Angela even claims that they saw each other almost every day in June and July.
To her credit, she was forthcoming with police and admitted that the affair was wrong. She also claimed that she was as surprised and saddened as anyone else when finding out about Jan's death, even though they didn't know each other, and that she never imagined Michael was connected to it. Like she is saying that this was not a plan that they had come up with together. She was very surprised that this had happened.
And although Angela was cooperative, Michael secured a lawyer and stopped talking to police almost immediately. Meanwhile, Angela was honest with police and shared a selection of emails with them when she was requested to do so.
But a search warrant brought the contents of the rest of the emails, which resulted in over 200 pages that were later presented in court, as well as Michael's phone records, which provided even more context for the events leading up to Jan's murder. ♪♪
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Michael first told Angela that he loved her on June 5th, 2008, just a week after they started dating. And Angela claimed that he was always the more forward one between the two of them. Clearly. Well, on July 8th, he wrote to her, quote, I am the happiest man alive. I'm going to marry you. And I'm going to make every day that we're together feel like it's the first day that we fell in love.
And to this, Angela responded, quote, So I get that Angela is being very forthcoming with police and she's saying that this affair was wrong. But at the same time,
She is making plans for the future with Michael. But neither of them are saying, you know, I'm going to file for divorce. I'm going to tell my spouse about us. And, you know, we're going to get out of our relationships and be together. Like, neither of them are saying that. Yeah, exactly. So it's kind of confusing. But on July 15th, Michael penned her quote, I knew from the moment that we kissed, I knew that I couldn't live without you. I can't live without you in my life.
I need to make you my wife, and I need to be your husband. I've never been so sure of anything in my life.
Well, then two days after this, he wrote, quote, I love you, Angela. I can't wait to make you my wife.
Now, on the morning of July 22nd, 2008, the day that his wife was killed, Michael stupidly wrote to Angela, quote, I have never experienced feelings like this in all of my 41 years, and I know the best is yet to come. Adding, quote, I am so deeply, madly, and completely in love with you, baby.
In another, he wrote, quote, I absolutely will never let you go. I need to be your husband, Angela. I need you to be my wife. And those are needs that will never diminish or subside. And then Angela wrote back, quote, You are everything to me, and I love you. When you take me as your wife, will be the happiest day of my life.
In yet another email, she said, quote, Interesting. Again, this is the freaking day that Jan is murdered. And she says she doesn't have to wait too much longer. So,
Very, very suspicious here. Questionable. Yeah. Well, Michael's attorney, Alan Sadomsky, however, dismissed this as the couple simply getting caught up in their affair and excited about this new romance and that it's not suspicious at all, which I do not agree with.
But remember, he's working for Michael, so he's very biased in this. Absolutely. So Angela later stated that she assumed all of this talk of marriage was hypothetical and she thought it may eventually lead to them leaving their spouses, but that she never dreamed that it would lead to murder or murder.
or she would have ended things with Michael. Yeah, so she's basically saying that, you know, this was just a fairy tale of ours, and, you know, we're really excited about this affair, but... Well, I do understand, you know, this is only two months in, so maybe it does make sense that they're not making concrete plans...
But it is weird that she had said that, you know, not much longer thing because that hints to there being a plan of some kind. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, it hints to her knowing that something nefarious might have might have happened. Or that the conversation of leaving their spouses did come up, but for, you know, a two month fling, you know,
Throughout the years and years that they've been with their spouses, this is so fresh that maybe she was like, oh, yeah, I love talking about being married to him, but we're still getting to know each other. Yeah, yeah, of course. And also this could just be, you know, the imagination running wild. Yeah, like the fun of it. Yeah, the fun of it or whatever. But I don't know. There's just some weird details about it.
Well, she actually later found out about at least one other affair that Michael had during his marriage. And this had been with a woman named Kathy who contacted Angela herself. So Jan's friends can corroborate this and say that even Jan knew about his affairs and that she had caught him back in 2003. So five years before her death, but that they had decided to work through it and not separate. Then came perhaps the biggest shock of all.
Michael was to be a father for the fifth time because guess what? Angela was pregnant, much to the shock of her husband, Randy, who, by the way, had a vasectomy after their second daughter was born. Poor Randy. Yeah.
So now he finds out that his wife is pregnant. He knows, of course, it can't be his. And this was only a week after Jan's death on August 1st, 2008, that Angela took that pregnancy test and it was positive. She told Michael about it that same day. Certain, of course, that he was the father of
And Angela remembers feeling shocked and in disbelief, but that Michael was really happy. Though, due to the fact that he was being investigated by police, he couldn't enjoy it the way that he wanted to. Oh, no, I can't. I can't enjoy my my mistress's baby that I'm having with her because I killed my wife. Yeah, exactly. Shut up. Well, look at this, because less than 24 hours later, Michael was arrested for the murder of his wife.
Michael was detained on August 2nd, 2008 and held without bail to await trial. And then on March 27th, 2009, so a few months later, while Michael awaited his fate, Angela gave birth to their son, Matthew.
Though both she and Michael acknowledged that their calls were being recorded between her phone and the phone he was using in prison, they spoke in April with Angela giving Michael updates about the baby. And this is kind of when things start to turn Heath because, you know, now he's arrested. He's been in jail and prison for months. He's awaiting a murder trial. And
He's not there, right? Yeah. And according to these conversations, as you guys are going to see, it really feels like she's starting to kind of cool on him. Yeah. She's stepping away a little bit, rightfully so. So during a phone call in April of 2009, Angela told him, quote, he's doing wonderful. He's a great baby. I gave my attorney some photos for you to see. He looks just like you.
Well, confident and assured, he told Angela, quote, I don't want you to give up on us. Angela said softly, um, I haven't. Michael continued that he, quote, totally planned on being out of here in August. To this, Angela laughed dryly and said, quote, let's hope so. And when they hung up, he said, I won't.
I love you. And then Angela laughed and paused before saying quietly, I love you too. So yeah, it doesn't seem like there's all this fairy tale talk going on anymore. Yeah, because if Angela is not involved in this, which by the way, there is no evidence that she knew anything about it or that she was involved in any kind of planning or plotting, then
then this must be a really tough situation for her. She loved this man. They had this very passionate fling for a couple months where they saw each other basically every day. They talked about getting married. They talked about spending the rest of their lives together. And then his wife dies. He's arrested for her murder and she gives birth to his child.
So that's a very confusing place to be. Yeah, it definitely is. And if she had any plans for the future of leaving her husband and, you know, Michael leaving Jan, all of that is out the window now. Yeah. And she's basically like, I don't really want to be involved with you anymore. Yeah. And those feelings will get bigger and bigger as we will get into.
Michael's trial began on July 13, 2009. Among the 60-plus witnesses called by the defense to testify were both Angela and Randy Funk.
When Angela took the stand, she was asked by the district attorney, Craig Stedman, if she and Michael discussed the financial ramifications of pursuing divorces. Angela said flatly, quote,
So the day of the murder was a particularly good one for Michael and Angela. They had three hours away from their spouses and kids between the hours of 1.30 and 4.30 p.m. And the last time that they spoke on the phone was 8.42 p.m. on the evening of Tuesday, July 22nd, the day that Jan was murdered. So again, he says originally that he went to bed at 9.30, then he said it was about 10, and he found her at 11. So...
So essentially, you know, right before his wife is murdered, he's on the phone with Angela talking to her. Angela remembers the conversation being brief and kind of surface level because Michael told her that he hadn't been feeling well and that he was headed to bed. However, in one prior account, she said that they discussed leaving their partners. This 17 minute phone call would be the last time that they would speak before Jan was killed.
Angela then made several calls at 9:37, 9:43, and 10:08 p.m. and sent a text message at 10:14 p.m., none of which garnered a response from Michael. To Michael's despair, Angela told the court that she was no longer pursuing a future with him and that she would be moving forward with her husband in hopes of mending a marriage which had become "very poor."
Now, she did claim that she would always love Michael as the father of her newborn baby, but as far as her involvement in Jan's murder, Angela's husband Randy confirmed that she was home the night of the murder.
Yeah, so again, it doesn't seem like there is any evidence or any circumstantial evidence even to prove that Angela was a part of this, that she knew anything about it. And it seems like she is being truthful when she says that she was very shocked by it happening.
Now, Jan and Michael's oldest son, Samuel, actually testified on the behalf of his father, which made Michael cry in court. So he explained that he remembers getting home from a friend's house to see his dad standing by one end of the pool crying while paramedics worked on his mother.
When asked by District Attorney Stedman if he was lying for his father, Samuel stated, quote,
So the defense's angle here was that robbery may have been the motive and that there was no actual direct evidence linking Michael to Jan's death, just circumstantial based on his behavior, the affair, and his proximity to the crime.
And through his attorney, Alan, Michael alleged in the weeks after Jan's murder that Jan was missing around $40,000 worth of jewelry, which Michael apparently believed had been taken off of her the night of her murder.
So defense pointed to a premeditated attack that she was chosen for the murder earlier in the day based on the jewelry that she was wearing and that she had been stalked back to her home and targeted in an attack motivated by the theft of her expensive wedding ring and watch.
But the prosecution poked holes in that theory because they presented security camera footage that showed Jan running an errand earlier that day in the same clothing that she had been wearing when she died. But she had not been wearing her jewelry, thus could not have been scouted as a murder or robbery victim.
So it seems like what most likely occurred is that Michael himself disposed of the jewelry to give a motive to a fictitious unknown assailant. Though his family and friends were very upset about his affair, by the way, they maintained that Michael absolutely could not have committed a murder to get out of his marriage. He just, he wouldn't have.
But based on the jewelry that eventually went missing, they believed that Jan was in fact murdered, but by an unknown intruder, not her husband. But the most compelling evidence was actually found on Jan herself.
So when medical examiner Dr. Wayne Ross testified, he explained, quote, her head was impacted multiple times. We know there's a tear behind the left ear, which I believe would have bled fairly profusely. And that alerted me to the fact that the blood had been cleaned up by someone. And then District Attorney Stedman added, quote, and of course, who's better capable and has better knowledge of cleaning up blood than a funeral director?
So this is really interesting because as we know, there was the, it appeared that parts of the home had been cleaned with bleach. There was that bucket with a rag in it when they found Jan's body. So it really did seem like a cleanup in some way had occurred and
And now here's the medical examiner saying there would have been a lot more blood at the scene than there was, which means that somebody would have had to have cleaned it up. And why would a random intruder do that? Exactly. And not only that, but there was DNA from Michael found underneath Jan's fingernails, which investigators believe explained the scratches on Michael's face.
When asked his justification for the scratches, Michael blamed his daughter, Stella, saying that they had been playing roughly in the pool. But that of course did not explain how his DNA got underneath of Jan's fingernails. One person did have an explanation though: Michael's son, Samuel Roseborough. Samuel claimed that before he left for a pool party at a friend's house, he had seen his mother scratching his father's back as they lounged by the pool.
But the scratches had been so deep, and the DNA so deep in the bed of her fingernails, that it had survived however long that she had been, you know, floating in this pool. So, a light back scratch didn't really make sense with the evidence. But ultimately, the court was not buying the defense's possibility of a burglary turned murder. And Michael was found guilty in September of 2009, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In the weeks after the verdict, he issued the following statement: "My name is Michael Roseborough. I've been accused of killing my wife Jan, who I've been married to for 19 years. I did not and I would never kill my wife. I had nothing to do with her murder and I miss her very much." Michael has attempted to appeal his conviction but to no avail, and he remains incarcerated in Pennsylvania today.
Surprisingly, the year after Michael's conviction, Angela agreed to be interviewed about the case. And when asked how she felt about Michael now, Angela said simply, quote, She also said that she hoped Michael would one day own up to his family and his children about what he had done, saying, quote,
Be honest to your family, to your kids, and to Jan's family. They deserve to know the truth. Angela continued to attempt to work things out with Randy and their two children, as well as baby Matthew. Yeah, I don't know. I believe that she wasn't involved in this. I think there would have been a lot more evidence, evidence,
you know, text messages or phone calls or anything like that to prove that. And I don't know why, like in this case, I feel like in a lot of cases, there's the insurance payout or there's religion involved. There's some kind of motive. So I don't understand still why,
why Michael would have killed his wife, Jan, unless that was, you know, he wanted it to happen fast. I mean, I don't know. I think he was just honestly infatuated with Angela, but I agree. He seemed very, very infatuated. Yeah. He was super, super into her. But also I agree with you that, you know, if they've got all of these text messages and these emails, like so many emails and text messages and phone calls, um,
If they had an inkling that Angela was involved, they would have been able to find something in all of that information to connect her, right? Right. And it makes me wonder if maybe...
Michael and Jan, you know, he had a great day with Angela and Michael and Jan were at the house that night and maybe they got into an argument and he killed her out of rage. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he was drinking at that time. So is it possible that, you know, his drunk inhibitions happened?
kind of, yeah, I'm not going to say, not using that as an excuse, but maybe he was drunk and just thinking, well, this is the time to do it. Yeah. I mean, it just really doesn't make sense why he wouldn't file for divorce. It doesn't make, it doesn't make any sense because had he have done that, he could have been with Angela. They would have had their baby and life would have been good. Jan could have moved on as well. Like I, I never understand that. And I also just don't have a murderer's brain, but yeah, it, in this case, it's really confusing to me.
Well, y'all know what I'm going to say. Get a divorce. Always. So in 2010, the Roseboro family sold the funeral home their family owned for over a century. And it's now operated by Straddling Funeral Homes.
And sadly, with Jan gone and, of course, Michael in prison, neither of them were able to care for their young children. So actually, Jan's sister Susie really stepped up. She moved into the Roseboro home, which is, again, where she grew up with her sister and her brother. And she began caring for the three youngest children. Because remember, Samuel was 17 when this happened. So he was already an adult by the time that this transition really, really settled in.
So Susie also founded Jan's Circle of Friends, which is a charitable organization in honor of her sister to spread awareness about domestic violence and the children caught in its crossfire. Jan's daughter, Rachel, has helped with this organization. She actually even designed posters to be distributed around the area's high schools, warning of the dangers of domestic violence and providing resources for anybody in need of help.
According to Susie, the kids have mostly come to terms with the fact that their mother, Jan Roseborough's death, was not an innocent drowning.
Thank you so much, everybody, for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes. Thank you guys so much for listening to this episode. What a crazy case. I mean, a
Again, if Michael had just filed for divorce, none of this would have happened, and those kids would still have a father and a mother. Yeah, and I really do think it speaks volumes that Angela herself is saying, dude, just come out with it. Just tell everybody what you did. Put your kids' minds at ease because they're totally unsure of what to think here. Michael was convicted for this, but because he is saying that he's innocent...
they don't know what to fully believe. So it's really devastating for them. Hopefully more concrete answers will come in the form of a confession.
and they can kind of move forward. Yeah, I really think that the DNA has basically settled it for everyone. The evidence that was there. So yeah, no question. Michael is guilty. It just sucks when they don't say that they are and explain why and what was going on and kind of just paint the whole scene so everybody can have some closure. It's just so disappointing. If you guys want to see photos from this case and all the other cases that we've covered,
Go check out our socials. We're on Instagram at Going West Podcast, and we're also on Facebook. All right, guys, we will see you on Tuesday. So for everybody out there in the world, don't be a stranger. ♪♪♪
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