Linda Stermer
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firefighters rush to the scene, but sadly arrive too late. A motionless man lies half-naked on the ground. As paramedics look closer, the poor victim has not only been badly burned, but he's also been run over. This is Forensic Tales, episode number 96, the story of Linda Stermer. ♪♪

Welcome to Forensic Tales. I'm your host, Courtney Fretwell-Ariola.

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The story we're talking about this week on the show has many people divided. The two sides are simple. You either think this is a case of cold-blooded first-degree murder, or you believe an innocent person was wrongfully convicted of society's worst crime. But for some people, they don't know what side to be on. Is Linda Stermer a heartless murderer? Or is she simply a woman with terrible, terrible luck?

Let's take a hard look at the forensic evidence. On January 7, 2007, firefighters responded to a house fire in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Neighbors called 911, reporting the house belonging to Linda and Todd Sturmer was on fire. Todd Sturmer was severely burned and clinging to life. Firefighters quickly arrived at the Sturmers and found Todd unresponsive near an oil tank next to the house.

Todd had been badly burned, and when paramedics arrived, they noticed he was partially dressed. He was only wearing a pair of boots and sweatpants, but was covered up by some blankets and clothes brought over by the neighbors who called 911. Paramedics quickly moved Todd's body away from the oil tank.

Once they moved him, they began performing life-saving procedures. But after five to ten minutes, there was nothing they could do. Todd was pronounced dead at the scene. But Todd didn't just get caught up in an accidental house fire. On top of suffering burns to his entire body, he was also run over by a car.

Todd's wife, Linda Stermer, told the police that she and Todd had been arguing throughout the day before the fire. According to Linda, the couple had been arguing a lot lately. On the day of the fire, she had plans of divorcing and leaving Todd.

She told the police that she sent their two sons to go to the movies that afternoon so that they wouldn't have to witness this huge blown out fight that they were going to have. She said she just didn't want her boys to watch their mother leave and divorce their father. According to Linda, after the two boys left the house to go to the movies, she went downstairs in the basement to do laundry around 3 o'clock p.m.

While doing laundry in the basement, she said she found a towel that smelled like fuel, almost like gasoline. Instead of doing anything about the towel, she simply threw it in the washing machine, turned it on, thinking that maybe her husband Todd may have used the towel while working on the car. A few minutes later, she said she heard Todd scream and ran upstairs to see what had happened.

As soon as she got upstairs, she said she saw a fire. She said Todd was trying to put the fire out, but it was massive and the fire was quickly taking up the entire room. She said she turned around, ran downstairs and ran out of the house. Instead of calling 911 herself, she decides to run out of the house and scream for the neighbors to help and call 911.

When the police asked Linda why didn't she take Todd with her, she assumed that he was right behind her when she ran out of the house.

When the officers asked her why she didn't call 911 herself, she said, again, she didn't think she needed to because in her heart of hearts, she believed that Todd, her husband, was right behind her. And if she could get out of the house safely, then certainly he could as well. So she ran out of the house without any shoes on and without her cell phone.

She then said she got inside of her van because she was going to go try and get some help. When she's inside the van, she said she briefly saw her husband Todd for a second through the driver's side window. She said he was on fire. So she said she got out of the van and told Todd to lie down so that he could put out the fire.

But after a few seconds of looking at her husband, she realized he was completely engulfed in flames and that there wasn't anything she could do to help him. Linda then said she put the van in reverse and then briefly pulled it forward. Then, finally, put the van in reverse for a second time to reverse out of the driveway. Linda Stermer ran Todd over.

Let's back up a little bit and let's talk about who Linda and Todd Sturmer are. How do we get to the part where their house ends up on fire and Linda ends up running him over with their van? Linda and Todd met back when they were 25 years old in 1989. If you ask either one of them, it was love at first sight.

Back in 1989, Linda was recently separated from her first husband and had two daughters, Ashley and Brittany. But having two young kids didn't seem to bother Todd. Right from the get-go, he took Ashley and Brittany in as if they were his own. He even told her not to worry, that he would give them a pair of boys, which he did.

Linda and Todd got married in August of 1993 and had two sons of their own, Trenton and Trevor. They even adopted Linda's nephew, Corey, when he was two years old. So with five kids in total, it seemed like Linda and Todd had their dream family.

Linda had a successful career of her own, and Todd coached their kids in every sport, from soccer to baseball, basketball, football, you name it, Todd was the coach. And besides coaching his kids, Todd enjoyed hunting, he took up carpentry, and he even built the family's home. But over the years, their marriage started to fall apart and burst at the seams.

The biggest problem the couple faced was finances. This problem isn't too surprising given the fact that financial issues are one of the leading causes of divorce in the U.S.,

So over the years, Linda and Todd started fighting about money. Linda thought that Todd was a little lazy and he just wasn't bringing in enough money. According to her, Todd just didn't like to work very hard, or at least not hard enough on the things that brought in money. But if you ask Todd and Linda's sons, Trenton and Trevor, they said their parents mostly fought over Linda's horses.

So Linda owned a ranch of 31 horses that she boarded. Now, here's what we have is two different sides to this story. Now, Linda claims that these 31 horses actually made her some money and made the family money. She says that she was making good money boarding these horses.

However, if you ask Trenton and Travis, they say that these horses were financially draining the family, that these 31 horses were just bleeding hundreds and thousands of dollars. And that's why, according to Trenton and Travis, that the couple, Todd and Linda, were in over $75,000 in debt at the time Todd died.

Now, Todd and Linda's children were at odds about what really was happening inside of their parents' marriage. According to Linda's two daughters, Brittany and Ashley, Todd had a temper. On several occasions, this temper seemed to get the best of him.

During an interview for the TV show 48 Hours, Brittany and Ashley paint a dark picture of their stepfather. They said that he was abusive towards their mom, both physically and emotionally. They said that as they got older and became teenagers, that the abuse turned to them.

They even pointed to one occasion during this interview when they said that Todd took a belt and beat the girls after they confronted him about how he was treating Linda. But the Sturmers' sons, Travis and Trenton, seem to have a much different picture of the marriage. According to the boys, yes, their dad did have a temper, but they said they never once saw their father be abusive towards their mom.

So we've got Linda's daughters who seem to support their mom, yet at the same time, the sons seem to support their father. But there was another problem in Linda and Todd's marriage. Rumors swirled that before Todd's death, Linda was having an affair with a co-worker of hers, a guy by the name of Chris Williams.

After uncovering dark secrets in Linda and Todd's marriage, the police started to grow suspicious about how the fire could have started and how Linda ended up running him over with the van, which she says was an accident.

On the day of the fire, Linda initially told the police that she didn't know how the fire started or how she ran him over with the van. She stuck to her story that she was doing laundry when she heard Todd scream from upstairs. She saw him trying to put the fire out.

Then when she ran out of the house and got inside the van, she said she saw Todd next to the van and he was on fire. But then he must have walked away because she said he wasn't there anymore when she put the car in reverse. She even said that she had no idea that she ran him over with the van until the neighbors from next door arrived to help.

And they found him lying on his back next to the garage. Finally, she said she realized he never stepped away. And that's when she realized that she must have accidentally ran him over. That's the initial story that she told the police. Two days later, her story seemed to change. Two days later, she was interviewed by the police for a second time.

This time, the police were also accompanied by fire investigators for the insurance company investigating the insurance claim. This fire to the Sturmer's house was massive. It pretty much destroyed the entire property. So for the insurance company to pay out on this claim, they sent over a handful of fire investigators to figure out exactly how this fire started.

So during this second interview with the police and with the fire investigators, Linda seems to suggest that Todd intentionally started the house fire because he was trying to kill her. In the interview, which was fully recorded and transcribed, investigators asked her if she had any opinions about what could have started the fire.

In her response, she said, quote, I feel like maybe Todd yelled at me once during the day and told me that no one else could have me. And I just, I think maybe he meant for both of us. I don't know. I don't think I was supposed to be there. End quote.

These statements suggest that maybe Linda believed that Todd intentionally set the fire and was trying to kill her. Or by making the statement that she didn't think she was supposed to be there, he was trying to kill both of them.

She also told investigators that Todd kept an oil lamp and candles burning in the home and that he would often have to get fuel from the house's furnace, which could explain how the towel seemed to smell like fuel, the one that she put in the laundry. So let's talk about this finding. A few minutes ago, I mentioned that Linda told the police that she came across this towel that smelled like gasoline while doing laundry that day.

When investigators searched the washing machine, they ended up finding two towels. When investigators sent both of the towels for forensic testing, both of the towels came back positive for gasoline. So Linda's saying that maybe Todd used these towels when bleeding the fuel from the furnace and that's how the fire started.

Now, I grew up in Southern California, so for someone like me, I am entirely unfamiliar with these terms, quote, burning fuel from the furnace. But these terms aren't uncommon for people like Linda and Todd. By all accounts, the house they lived in was a farm. So it wasn't entirely unusual or uncommon for someone like Todd to, quote, bleed fuel from the furnace.

So the police and fire investigators begin to doubt Linda's story. They're starting to suspect that not only did Linda start the fire, but that when she realized her husband Todd didn't die in the fire, she then intentionally ran him over with the van.

But how could someone like Linda overpower someone like Todd? Todd is a big, big, beefy guy. He's athletic. He coaches his kids' team in practically every sport under the sun. So the Kalamazoo police wondered, did she poison him? Did she sedate him before the fire? Maybe she struck him over the head with something.

And the only way to answer these questions is to perform an autopsy. Todd's autopsy revealed that he died from a combination of smoke inhalation and burns from the fire. The forensic pathologist couldn't determine whether the blunt force injuries to his head were from being struck by a weapon, being hit by the van, or a combination of both.

So the forensic pathologist also tested Todd's blood. And here's where things get interesting. The blood test came back negative for any controlled substances in his system. But when the toxicology report came back from the lab, they showed the presence of Vicodin in his urine. This test suggests that Vicodin was ingested either hours or days before his death.

The drug was cleared from his blood, but not cleared from his urine. Once a substance passes through our blood, it then passes through our urine. Now, even though the forensic pathologist couldn't say for sure how Todd got those blunt force injuries to his head, I think what's important here is that the police just simply weren't buying Linda's story.

For starters, they didn't believe that she could make it out of the burning house safely while Todd became completely engulfed in flames.

Second, they didn't believe that she could accidentally run him over with the van and not realize that he was right there. Then third, there's the story about how Linda sent their two sons to the movies that afternoon so that they wouldn't be inside the house.

According to the sons, right after Linda told them that they had to leave and go to the movies that day, they went to go talk to their dad because, well, they just didn't want to go to the movies. But when they tried to speak with him, Linda pushed them away and said, no, no, no, your dad is sleeping. Go to the movies as I told you. Number four, there's another critical piece of forensic evidence.

The police tested both Todd and Linda's clothing, the clothes that they were wearing that afternoon. And when they tested Todd's clothing, it came back positive for traces of gasoline. Linda's clothing came back negative.

So for the police and fire investigators, this discovery was huge. According to them, this meant that Todd was likely at the center of the fire. His clothes were drenched in gasoline. While on the other hand, Linda didn't have a drop of fuel on her. One part of Linda's story that we haven't talked about yet is what she told the police she did on the morning of the fire.

We know that she told her sons to go to the movies. She and Todd were arguing about something, probably something to do with money. But what she did before that, what did she do? Well, according to Linda's own story to the police, she said she went to the gas station to fill up her Chevy Blazer and stopped to get breakfast for her and Todd.

A little weird, she said she stopped to get breakfast for her husband after telling the police that she was planning to divorce him later that day. But back to her story, she told the police that she filled up the truck because she wanted to make sure that the tank was full for when the boys used it to go to the movies. When the police tracked down the employee who worked at the gas station that day,

He told the police that he remembered seeing Linda that morning. Only, he said that she wasn't filling up her truck with gas. Instead, according to him, it looked like she was filling up a gas can. Records of the receipt confirmed that Linda spent a little over $11 at the gas station. When the police asked why the amount was so low if she filled up her truck,

She stuck to her story that she wasn't filling up the entire tank. She was just topping the gas tank off. It wasn't empty. And she simply just wanted to make sure that it was full for the boys. This part of Linda's story bothered the police. An $11 receipt seemed more consistent with the gas station employee's account that she was filling up a gas can and wasn't filling up her car.

Was it possible that this is what was used to start the house fire? Later on, investigators found two gas cans inside of the burned Sturmer home. But because the fire had burned through the gas cans so badly, the police couldn't determine whether either of the cans were used or was used to start the fire.

They also weren't able to recover any fingerprints from the gas can to be able to figure out who handled them. But all of this doesn't amount to enough evidence for an arrest. So even though the police and investigators are suspicious about Linda and her story, they just don't have their nail in the coffin.

So they continued to investigate the case over the next two years. And in 2009, the police believed they had enough evidence and Linda Stermer was arrested on first-degree murder charges for killing her husband, Todd.

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On June 5th, 2009, over two years after Todd's death, Linda was arrested and charged with premeditated murder and with felony murder in the course of committing arson. Under Michigan law, both charges are considered first degree murder. During their investigation, the police and prosecutors believed Linda either sedated or knocked Todd unconscious before dousing him with gasoline and setting the house on fire.

And then when he somehow managed to escape the fire, she ran him over with the couple's van. But Linda's defense presented a much different version of events. According to the defense team, the fire was either started accidentally or was intentionally started by Todd and that Linda accidentally ran over Todd with the van.

In either scenario, the defense argued that Linda is simply just the world's unluckiest woman. Her husband tried to kill her by setting the house on fire, and then she accidentally ran him over with a van, killing him instead.

At the criminal trial, both sides called dozens of forensic experts and witnesses to the stand to testify to support either the prosecution or the defense's theory of the case. The first forensic expert called to testify for the prosecution was a fire investigator. The fire investigator was Detective Sergeant Scott Leroy, who worked for the Michigan State Police Fire Investigation Unit.

The prosecution called in Scott Leroy to tell the jury exactly what caused the fire and where the fire started. And based on his investigation of the Sturmer home, he concluded that the fire started in the first floor living room. And most importantly, based on his investigation, he concluded that Linda intentionally started the fire.

On the stand, he walked the jury step by step how he came to this conclusion. He testified at the speed at which the fire spread throughout the living room and the rest of the house. He compared areas throughout the home with the most fire damage to areas of the home with very minor damage. He studied the time of day and the fact that there were two adults inside the home.

And although he couldn't determine whether or not accelerants were used, the carpet throughout the living room had been completely burned and destroyed by the fire. And then finally, Detective Leroy went back to the forensic evidence found on Todd and Linda's clothing.

He told the jury how tests revealed gasoline on Todd's clothing, but not on Linda's clothing, which caused him to believe in all of his experience and his expert opinion caused him to believe that Todd was at the center of the fire, not Linda.

Once Detective Leroy finished testifying for the prosecution, Linda's defense attorneys had the opportunity to call their own fire investigator to the stand, but they chose not to. Now, I don't know if they couldn't find one or maybe they couldn't afford one, or if it's simply because the defense didn't refute this theory that Linda

They didn't refute that the fire was intentionally started. The defense said that they believed Todd set the fire to try and kill Linda or try and kill both of them. So if you're Linda's defense attorney, I don't really think you need to call your own expert just to come on the stand and say that the fire was intentionally started.

This prosecution expert isn't saying anything that the defense isn't, except for the fact that the prosecution expert is saying that Linda started the fire and the defense is saying that no, Todd was the one. But they're not arguing over the fact that this fire was in fact intentionally started, whether it was from Linda or whether it was started from Todd.

So after the fire investigator, the prosecution called a woman named Kate Fox to the stand to testify. Kate Fox was a former friend of Linda's, and according to her, before the fire, Linda had confided in her about her marriage to Todd. She said Linda told her that Todd was physically and emotionally abusive towards her and that she had recently met with a divorce attorney.

At first, you might think this testimony goes in favor of the defense, but Kate Fox went on. Next, she told the jury that her friend Linda had spent years thinking about ways to, quote, Kate Fox even said that Linda mentioned running him over with a car to get him out of her life.

But even more damning is when Kate Fox told the jury about a phone call that she had with Linda after the fire. According to Fox, Linda called her asking to borrow a flashlight because she needed to get back in to the burned home to find a coffee mug containing a sedative and that she needed to find it before the police and fire investigators did.

Linda's defense attorney had an opportunity to cross-examine Kate Fox on the stand. And during cross-examination, the jury heard all about the falling out between these two women in the months before the fire.

So the defense was saying to the jury, look, you can't believe everything this woman is saying because these two women didn't like each other at the time. And not only did they not like each other, they weren't friends anymore. Linda reportedly owed Fox over $5,000.

So the defense is saying if there's anyone out there who's willing to go on the stand in a criminal trial and make things up about Linda and her marriage to Todd, it's going to be someone like Kate Fox. The prosecution also called Chris Williams to testify. This is the name we mentioned earlier. Chris Williams was the alleged co-worker that Linda was having an affair with at the time of Todd's death.

Chris Williams testified that, yes, he was having a romantic affair with Linda at the time, a romance that Todd found out about right before his death. But according to him, according to Chris Williams, Linda never confided in him about what happened that day, the day that Todd died. During their conversations, she maintained her innocence and said that she didn't start the fire.

The prosecution also called two jailhouse informants to testify, Veronica Navarro-Tracy and Dardita Gordon. Veronica Navarro-Tracy told the jury that she overheard Linda saying something about hitting Todd over the head with a frying pan, and that's how she was able to gain control over him before setting the house on fire.

Then there was Dardita Gordon. According to Gordon, Linda told her while in jail that she hit her husband over the head with something before setting the house on fire. She didn't mention a frying pan, but she also said that Linda confided in her. Now, I know what you're thinking because I'm probably thinking the same thing you are. You can't exactly believe everything that comes out of a jailhouse informant's mouth.

Let's be honest. Jailhouse informants can have a lot of incentive to lie on the stand.

Many times these individuals are offered something by the prosecution in exchange for their testimony, whether that's better conditions in prison. And sometimes in big cases such as this one where we're talking about first degree murder, it can often lead to time being taken off their sentence if they agree to cooperate with the prosecution and they agree to come sit on that stand and testify against that individual.

Now, I couldn't find anything about what Gordon or Tracy got in exchange for their testimony if they received anything at all. But like you, I have concerns about using jailhouse informants, especially in first degree murder cases where the stakes are so high. In my opinion, the most interesting witness called to the stand to testify at trial was Todd's mother.

Todd's mom testified that not just one of Todd's homes had been previously burned down, but she said two of her son's previous homes had mysteriously burned to the ground.

Linda's defense argued that this testimony from Todd's own mother further points to the fact that Todd was the one who started the fire, not Linda. That coupled with the financial trouble that they were having, remember, they have almost $80,000 in debt at the time.

The prosecution, I'm sorry, the defense is saying that Todd was an arsonist, that he had burned down his house to cash out insurance policies, and that now this is the third mysterious house fire. Before turning the case over to the jury, the prosecution called one last witness to testify.

And that was the gas station employee who saw Linda at the gas station before the fire. Remember, this is the employee who said, no, she didn't fill up her truck. She definitely was filling up what looked like to be one of those typical red gas cans. He said he believed this because the back window of Linda's truck was open and

and that through the open window, he could clearly see Linda standing at the back of her truck, not on the side where the gas tank of her car was, and that from his angle, he said that she was using the pump and standing at the back of the truck and was filling up a gas can, not standing on the side like you'd expect to see if someone was filling up their car.

Now, this same gas attendant also testified that he had seen Linda come to that gas station on several previous occasions where she did the same thing and filled up gas cans. When all was said and done, both the state and defense had the opportunity to present evidence. Linda decided not to testify in her defense.

The prosecution rested its case by saying that even though most of the evidence is circumstantial, when considering all of the evidence as a whole, it points towards Linda's guilt.

She was the one who started the fire, and when she found out that Todd didn't die like she expected, she decided to use the car to run him over. And to prove her guilt, the prosecution pointed out how she never once tried to call 911, even after she knew her house was on fire and that Todd was inside. As for a motive, the prosecution argued that the couple was in over $75,000 in debt and

She would stand to gain in the event of his death. They also pointed to the affairs and the arguing over the years. In the end, the prosecution painted Linda as a cold-blooded killer who wanted out of her marriage with Todd. And instead of filing for divorce, she killed him.

In the words of the prosecution, she had the motive. She had the opportunity. She got the gas. She sent the boys away. She didn't call for help. She ran him over. And then she told lie after lie after lie.

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Here's the part of the story where I could say, end of story. But that's not how this one ends.

After being convicted of murdering her husband, Linda filed a direct appeal with Michigan's appellate court. In her appeal, she cited three arguments for a new trial. Number one, a state law procedural issue. Number two, she believed that the trial court should have never convicted her with what was described as insufficient evidence. And number three, quote,

End quote.

Linda argued that the trial court and prosecutors simply didn't have enough evidence to convict her. All of the evidence presented at trial was circumstantial at best, and the little amount of forensic evidence they had in the case simply wasn't enough to warrant someone being convicted of first-degree murder.

So in 2011, two years after Linda's conviction, the Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed her argument on all three counts. Basically, they agreed that there wasn't sufficient evidence pointing towards her guilt at the time of her trial. Over the next couple of years, Linda and her attorneys filed countless motions, including a pro se habeas corpus petition.

They argued that Linda should be released from prison while pending a new criminal trial. Finally, after several years behind bars, a federal judge called for an evidentiary hearing of her case in 2018. By this point, Linda had been in prison since 2009.

After reviewing all of the evidence collected by the police during their investigation, as well as reviewing the evidence presented at trial, the federal judge in 2018 agreed with Linda Stermer. He agreed with her so much that he vacated her conviction and put in an order for her immediate release from prison. And just like that, Linda Stermer was a free woman.

The state appealed the federal court's ruling, citing that they had enough evidence to bring forward charges against Linda and they had enough evidence to convict her in front of a jury of her own peers.

But in May 2020, judges with the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled to uphold the 2018 decision, meaning that Linda, to this day, almost two years later after her appeal was heard, remains free on bond.

Linda Stermer currently lives in Michigan following her release from prison. She lives with her two daughters, who fiercely believe in their mother's innocence. Her two sons, on the other hand, don't believe their mother. They believe she killed their father. Following Linda's release, the Michigan State Attorney General's office decided to retry Linda for Todd's murder.

They're hopeful that this second case will be brought to trial sometime next year. Once again, Linda Stermer will be put on trial for her husband, Todd Stermer's murder. What will the latest forensics tell us? How will this story end? Only time will tell. To share your thoughts on the Linda Stermer story, be sure to follow the show on Instagram and Facebook.

Do you think Linda is responsible for killing her husband? Or do you believe Linda that Todd was the one who started the fire and that she accidentally ran him over with a van? Or do you think something else happened? To find out what I think about Linda's guilt, sign up to become a patron of the show at patreon.com slash forensic tales.

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Until then, remember, not all stories have happy endings.

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Until then, remember, not all stories have happy endings.