The Murder of Roberta 'Bobbie' Miller
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I'm Kristen Sevey. This is Murder, She Told. Madeline knew right away that the morning news was talking about her daughter, even though they didn't use her name. They referred only to a Guilford woman, but Madeline knew they were talking about Bobby. Her Bobby, her 54-year-old daughter.

The newscaster said that there was a woman in Guilford found dead in her home. Her dog, too. It was November 2nd, 2010. Madeline had just spoken to her daughter a few days prior. She was in good spirits. She was just getting settled into her new home. She said she was going to build some window box planters that weekend. A lifetime of memories came flooding over her. How could this happen to her Bobby?

Soon after the program ended, the phone rang. It was the state police. They were a matter of fact when they told Bobby's family that she was dead. This is Bobby's brother, Ken, who was one year younger than her.

I left early that morning, I was out in the woods, I was hunting and I never take a phone with me in the woods. And I came home as I drove up my driveway, I could see my mother standing in the window. So my mother lived with us. We had an in-law apartment for my mother and her husband. My father was deceased, my mother was remarried. And I remember driving up the driveway and seeing my mother in the window with a really foreign look on her face.

And as I drove around back to park and walk in through the garage, my wife came out and just said, she said, Bobby's dead. And I, you know, there's no explaining your emotions when you hear something like that. There's no explaining it. It's the first time I've actually ever repeated that, to be honest, that that's exactly how it was. And that's pretty tough. That's an understatement. It's...

The days following were a whirlwind. Bobbie was part of a big family. Her mother, Madeline, was 80 years old. Bobbie had two adult children, a daughter, Jennifer, who was 25, and a son, Jonathan, who was 23. She also had five siblings, four sisters and one brother.

She had an ex-husband. The divorce had just been finalized. Her father was gone. He had died 17 years prior. Everyone in the family said that it was a blessing that he didn't have to bury his own daughter. She was his favorite. The family converged in New Hampshire near Manchester, not far from where they all grew up as kids. Some had flown in from Tennessee and California. They all learned of the tragedy and grieved together.

The police questioned each of the family members and took statements individually at the dining room table in Ken's house. The police were looking for leads. They needed help. They asked about people in Bobby's life, particularly her ex-husband Gary. They asked Ken, do you think Gary is capable of this? And after some hesitation, he said yes.

Madeline told the cops that Bobby was afraid of Gary. Bobby's younger sister, Chris, said that she remembered a time that Gary was violent. He had punched a wall next to the refrigerator in the home that he'd shared with Bobby. And even if it wasn't Gary who pulled the trigger, Ken believed that it was, quote, a professional job. And he believed that Gary had the resources to hire somebody to make it happen.

in an angry email that Bobbi had sent Gary two days prior to her death. She wrote, in part, For an adult, 53 years old, to continue to manipulate and create such destruction for any other person is extremely alarming and fearful. I am scared of your bottomless hate that knows no limitations.

With the exception of his daughter, nearly the whole family was in agreement. Gary Miller, her ex-husband, was responsible. Ken was the primary point of contact for the family, and he was of the mind to let the police do their job. In the meantime, the family laid Bobby to rest. Bobby's obituary was published in the Manchester Union-Leader, but in an unusual move, there were no details about her funeral service.

There is a disagreement in the family about whether the public would be invited. In the end, the people who knew, knew. And those who didn't were invited to attend her celebration of life in Guilford, New Hampshire, the small town where Bobby's new home now sat empty.

The family and a couple hundred others attended Bobby's funeral in Manchester. There was a visitation at Faneu Funeral Home. It was intended to be open casket, but when the family got there, they closed it. Bobby would never look the same again. Bobby's mother, Madeline, was Catholic, and they had a mass at St. Elizabeth Seton, a Catholic church in Bedford, very close to where the family grew up.

Soon after, Bobbie was cremated and her name was engraved on a family mausoleum at a cemetery in Manchester. Her father was cremated as well, and some of her ashes were put with his, reuniting them in death.

Time passed, but no arrest came. Police said that the person who killed Bobby had targeted her. They didn't believe that it had been a random home invasion. They probably said this for two reasons. One, to share some information about where their investigation had taken them. And two, to reassure residents of Guilford that they didn't believe the killer was indiscriminately murdering people. As the months went by, a new narrative began to take hold.

Gary was being very cooperative with the police. He took a polygraph immediately. Though I don't have the results, I've heard that the police were satisfied with him. He had an alibi for the time frame of Bobby's death. He was with his new wife. He didn't even lawyer up. Gary was behaving like somebody who was innocent.

The family began to suspect someone else, one of Bobbie's own children. Bobbie was so protective of her children, it was hard to imagine. Bobbie's own childhood had instilled in her the importance of family. Some of Ken's best memories with Bobbie are from that time. Bobbie was born in Manchester, New Hampshire on September 25th, 1956.

She was seven years old when she moved with her many siblings into the house that she would spend most of her formative years on Amherst Street in Bedford, New Hampshire. Ken remembers her as a tough older sister, and though they had their feuds, they got along pretty well. Ken was one year and one month younger than Bobby. One incident stood out in his mind.

So I was five years old or younger. Bobby was a year older than me, so she would have been six probably. And this kid was picking on me, kind of a neighborhood bully. And my sister, you know, pushed him down and actually climbed on him and started pummeling him. This is hard to believe out of a six-year-old, but this is, I'm telling you, this is what happened. Of course, my father came out and the kid's father came over from across the street. And my father stood there with his arms crossed while

Well, my sister pummeled this kid and the kid's father just stood there and never said a word. You know, Bobby pummeled him for a while and he had had enough. So she got up and let him go. And that was the end of that. But it's funny because she remembered it, too. And we talked about it as the years went by when we were older. We talked about that several times and it was comical.

Though Bedford, by reputation, is an affluent small town just southwest of Manchester, the Dions grew up working class in a sprawling farmhouse built in 1879.

We lived out in the country. It was a great big old farmhouse with an attached barn built in the 1870s. We had ponies and chickens and ducks and my sisters liked the ponies of course and then dogs and cats of course they liked them and they didn't have anything to do with the chickens.

It was, I'm going to say it was great. It wasn't so great. So when I was 10 years old, my parents gave me 25 chickens for my birthday. That meant I had to take care of those chickens. I had to feed them every day and collect the eggs every day. And my parents reaped the benefits because there were six kids, five sisters and myself and my parents. And I remember thinking,

We ate a lot of eggs. I remember we used to eat eight dozen eggs a week. And then I would sell eggs to some of the neighbors, but I had to walk three miles to sell a dozen eggs for 50 cents. I wasn't too crazy about that. My friends and I got some pigs and we raised them in our barn.

and we named them after girls we knew in high school. I won't mention the names, but we did name them after some of the girls we knew. We thought that was quite funny. The Dion house was a hub of activity. Ken explained that their house was a hangout, and that his parents liked it that way. They wanted to know what was going on. Bobby's father kept a close eye on her and her sisters.

Ken remembered that Bobby, in particular, was the apple of her father's eye. Every one of us would tell you that Bobby was my father's favorite. And even though I say they didn't play favorites, but boy, Bobby knew how to work my father.

And my father was tough. He was very strict. My sisters were all very good looking girls. The boys just flocked to our house. My father was very, very strict. You know, if he said to be home at 10 o'clock, that didn't mean 10.01. It meant 10 o'clock. And of course, most of us, we'd come in at, you know, five past 10, 10 past 10 or whatever. Bobby would come in at five minutes of. He'd score some big brownie points.

But then once my parents went to sleep, she'd sneak out the window and go back out. And they never knew it. It was the funniest thing. But she knew how to work my father for sure. Ken, being the only boy, got stuck with mowing the grass. They only had a push mower, and there were two acres of sloping fields.

There was so much that Ken would take a section each day. And by the time he got to the end, it would be time to mow the first section again. But Ken remembered there were some benefits to having older sisters. As my sisters got a little older and their boyfriends were teenagers and driving, they'd come to the house. My father would make them mow the lawn. So Barley's boyfriend, Mark, she went out with Mark for quite a while.

He was a schmoozer too. He knew how to work my father, but he would mow the lawn quite a bit. And I really liked that because these guys were trying to score brownie points with my parents and I was reaping the benefits. I was pretty happy about that. Ken remembered that Bobby always managed to dress well on a tight budget.

My mother sewed for a living. My mother had her own business doing draperies and things like that. And Bobby just picked it up from my mother, I guess. And all through grammar school and high school, she'd make her own clothes. And she'd cut her own patterns and just sew her own clothes and beautiful stuff. She just had very good ideas. She was a good seamstress and she just made a lot of stuff. She was good at it. Bobby got a lot of sun as a kid and would often sport a very dark tan.

So we lived in this old farmhouse and it had a porch roof out front. And, you know, it was not a busy road because we were in the middle of no place. But my sisters would lay out on that porch roof to get a suntan. And, of course, somebody went by and saw that. They generally drive by a couple of times. And my mother would just be so mad at my sisters. It was funny.

She was voted best body in school, in high school, and she didn't like that. I remember she was angry about that. I guess it was a compliment, but she wasn't really thrilled about it. Bobby and Ken both went to West High School in Manchester, which was about five miles away. At first, they took the bus, but once Bobby started driving, she would give him a lift.

She would just drive as fast as she could. Living in the country, there were windy roads. And oh my gosh, I just remember her, you know, 60 miles an hour down the road with the tires squealing. She'd pick up a couple of her girlfriends that lived further away from us. So we'd drive up to their house, pick them up, then turn around and drive to school. Of course, she would be in a big hurry.

Because we probably left the house late. And yeah, she just, man, she went like a bat out of hell. Shortly after graduating high school in 1975, Bobby left the snow and ice of New England for the Southwest Desert.

She went out there with her girlfriend, Cheryl. They were both about 18 years old. It was right out of high school. I don't know why they picked Arizona, but they went out to Tucson. I think they got jobs as waitresses out there. I don't know. They might have been out there for about a year. I'm not sure, but...

I remember sitting at home one day. My father was sitting in the living room and the door opened up and it was my sister, Bobby, and she had decided to move back home. And her and her girlfriend, they never said a word to anybody. They just drove back home and she walked through the door. And I remember my parents, both of them were stunned about my father happened to be sitting there. I don't remember where my mother was, but yeah, just stunned that, you know, Bobby walked through the door and just said, you know, hello, I'm home.

I'm sending my brother money directly to his bank account in India because he's apparently too busy practicing his karaoke to go pick up cash. Thankfully, I can still send money his way. Direct to my bank account.

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That's knix.com, promo code TRY15 for 15% off life-changing period underwear. That's K-N-I-X dot com. Not long after returning from her journey, Bobbi moved to the west side of Manchester with some of her girlfriends. She had a blue Pontiac Sunbird with a white top. It was the height of the disco years. Bobbi was waitressing at some Manchester restaurants when she met Gary Miller, who was working as a bouncer at the bar that she went to.

They were around the same age, and they hit it off. By 1981, they were married. Gary was 24, and Bobby was 25. They were a young, beautiful couple. They moved out to the Midwest for Gary's job for some time. He was ambitious, and this was a step in his plan to one day have his own business.

In December of 1984, when Bobbie was 28, she gave birth to her first child, Jennifer. Two and a half years later, she gave birth to her son, Jonathan. Bobbie, Gary, and their two kids were a family unit, and after their stint in the Midwest, they moved back to New Hampshire, where they lived for many years in Wolfboro, a hilly town on the eastern shore of a vast lake called Winnipesaukee.

Bobby wasn't quite home, but it was within spitting distance, about an hour and a half from her hometown of Bedford. Their home was in the woods of rural New Hampshire. They were right next to an actual campground and about five miles from the town center of Wolfboro.

They got along very well with the people in the community. Gary grew his car dealership to a very large and successful dealership. I think he was pretty well respected in the community, along with Bobby. They lived in an old farmhouse, fixed it up really nice. We would go up there, you know, Thanksgiving. You know, we always saw each other at holidays, birthdays and holidays and graduations, you know, usual family stuff.

But it was always real pleasant when we got together. Bobby enjoyed hiking, kayaking, crafting, and doing stained glass work. She was crafty. But more importantly, she was very involved with her children's lives. Gary was no longer a humble mechanic. He had two car dealerships, Auto Village of Wolperow and Miller Ford in Sanford, Maine. And he had a tire shop, Tamworth Tire in Tamworth, New Hampshire.

After the kids were older and more independent, Bobby took a job in town at a local hardware store. But everything changed in 2007. The kids were grown. Jennifer was 22 and Jonathan was 21. Gary and Bobby were on the rocks. They separated in June and filed for divorce on September 19, citing irreconcilable differences.

They had been married for 26 years. Bobby was 51 and Gary was 50. I just remember talking to Bobby about it early on. And, you know, I was disappointed. I mean, I wasn't disappointed in her. I was disappointed to see it happen. And I remember saying, geez, I, you know, I just I really like Gary. And she just kind of chuckled. She said, well, I like him, too, but I just can't live with him.

The divorce was reported to be long and nasty. After going through mediation, the final divorce decree was signed on August 13, 2010, three years later. During that time, there was a financial crisis in 2008, which caused commercial and consumer credit to dry up. This, in conjunction with the divorce, was more than Gary could handle.

Gary had to close down Miller Ford in 2009 in the middle of the divorce proceedings, and all of the remaining businesses were to be sold as part of the divorce settlement, with the proceeds split 50-50 between Gary and Bobby. Bobby was moving on and decided to buy a home on the other side of Lake Winnipesaukee in the town of Guilford. She picked out a modest home on Country Club Road for $190,000. She got a dog, too, a yellow lab she named Sport.

On September 25, 2010, Bobbi celebrated her 54th birthday in her new home, inviting many of her friends over to celebrate the finalization of her divorce and the beginning of a new life. Though she had some work experience, as an ad sales rep for a Wolfboro newspaper called Granite State News, as a real estate agent, and as a cashier at a local painting shop in Wolfboro, she was looking to start a new career.

She enrolled at Granite State College, and though the main campus was in Concord, she was taking classes primarily from their Rochester, New Hampshire campus. She was pursuing a degree in business. Even though she was taking steps toward a new and independent future, in a new home, and in a new town, she still had things left to take care of in the divorce.

Gary's lawyer filed a motion alleging that Bobby wasn't meeting her end of the bargain to handle the sale of their old property in Wolfboro. He claimed that she was dragging out the process in an effort to run up Gary's legal fees and, quote, ruin him emotionally and economically.

The crux of the matter seemed to be Bobby's share of the taxes that were due from 2009. Their tax return was prepared in early 2010, and it appears that Bobby hadn't paid her share, which, by the time of Gary's filing, was worth about $72,000. Bobby claimed that she didn't have the money, but Gary's attorney pointed out that Bobby had received about $928,000 over the course of the three-plus years of divorce proceedings.

Where was the money? He asked the court. Bobby responded to the motion, claiming that she didn't have the money. A hearing was set for the first week of November. It was the weekend prior to her court date, Halloween weekend.

On Friday evening, she was out on a date. On Saturday, she went out to a nice dinner in Lakeport with her friend Diane on the shores of Lake Apeachee at O' Steaks and Seafood. She and Diane were both majoring in business and taking classes together at Granite State College. After dinner, they returned to Bobby's home and watched movies until late at night. Diane left around 1 a.m. to go home.

On Sunday, October 31st, the day of Halloween, Bobbi was working around the house and constructing window boxes. She'd spoken separately to both of her kids and to her mother over the weekend, and told them of her plans to convert the garage into a stained glass studio. She went to the Lowe's on Route 3 in Guilford around 5 p.m., just five miles from home. Police have the security footage of her from that visit. It was the last time she was seen alive.

The neighborhood that she was in wasn't the sort that had many trick-or-treaters, so she settled in for a quiet Halloween evening. Bobby's daughter, Jennifer, said that Bobby was procrastinating in completing an assignment for one of her online classes that was due on Sunday night. The paper was never submitted, suggesting that Bobby was killed before she completed it.

Jennifer theorized that she might have been down the hall from the kitchen working in her office on the computer when she was interrupted by her killer. When the killer came into the home, they would have found Bobby's car in the driveway, clearly indicating she was there.

According to Jennifer, the killer fired a shotgun blast into the kitchen where Bobby was standing from the living room, based upon the location of the chunks of wood and beams that were later taken as evidence by the police. The living room and kitchen were adjacent to each other and a large opening separated them. She died within seconds. The shot struck her in the head and neck and perforated her skull, brain, and lungs.

Although the first shot would have killed Bobby almost immediately, the killer took aim and shot Bobby a second time.

The first time she was shot, she was facing the person that shot her. And she was wearing a hoodie. And the first time she was shot, she was shot in the kind of in the face and the throat area. And the hood captured some of the blast. And she fell on the floor and then was shot again in the back of the head. Also home was Bobby's yellow Labrador retriever, Sport.

The killer shot the dog twice as well and left both of their bodies in the house. Because of the layout of the house, Jennifer thought that the killer might have entered through the front door. From interior photos of the home, it appears that the kitchen and the adjacent eating area are directly accessible from the side door of the house, the door that Bobby primarily used.

The kitchen dining area is almost fully enclosed, and there is just one opening that leads to the rest of the house. The living room is accessible from the front door, which led Jennifer to conclude that the killer may have entered the home from the front. There was no sign of forced entry, which meant that either the killer had a key, Bobby let them in willingly, or Bobby had left one or both of the exterior doors unlocked.

Jennifer said that Bobby's dog, Sport, was a barker, so she theorized that if there were an intruder or someone unfamiliar or threatening, Sport would have approached the killer first. The killer may have shot the dog and then Bobby. Bobby had two neighbors, one to the north and one to the south. From the kitchen to the neighbor's house to the north is 200 feet. From the kitchen to the neighbor to the south is 150 feet.

Though there were at least four shotgun rounds fired inside of Bobby's home, neither neighbor told the press that they had heard anything. The killer slipped away unnoticed. On Monday afternoon, Bobby's son, Jonathan, called 911 from Bobby's home between 4 and 4.30 p.m. Ken's wife said that Jonathan had told her that he had called Bobby from work on Monday, but she hadn't picked up, so he decided to go by the house to see her in person.

He lived in Guilford, too, so he was close. By 4:30 p.m., her neighbors to the north were called seeing police arriving in droves. By 5:00 p.m., Country Club Road was shut down. There were fire trucks, ambulances, and police cruisers everywhere. By 6:00 p.m., a detour was set up while New Hampshire State Police Major Crimes Unit processed the scene. Sometime Monday evening, Bobby's daughter, Jennifer, who was in California, was notified.

Bobby's children were the first in the family to learn of her death. It wasn't until Tuesday morning that her mother heard the terrible news on the TV. In a macabre coincidence, another shooting took place in Pittsburgh, New Hampshire on Tuesday morning as well, which put a strain on police resources.

Not only that, there were many crime scene techs who were in court to testify in another murder trial. As a result, there were some delays in the processing of Bobby's crime scene. The road remained closed for much of the week. Though police were tight-lipped about the case, it was almost immediately reported as suspicious. The lack of information riled locals, who were irritated about the extended road closure.

In an angry letter, Guilford Town Administrator Scott Dunn said, People deserve to know something about this crime, if, in fact, there has been a crime committed. News reporters spoke to Bobby's neighbors to the north, who said that she had just moved in recently and had come over to the house to introduce herself to him and his wife. He remembered seeing her walking her dog on Country Club Road. He said that her son, Jonathan, would visit her often.

Bobby's body was taken to Concord, New Hampshire, and on Wednesday, an autopsy was conducted by the chief medical examiner. A toxicology screen later came back negative for drugs, alcohol, or poison. The only factor in her death was the obvious one, the gunshot wounds. In the beginning, nobody, neither the family nor the police, had a clue about the motive. Sexual assault was ruled out. Bobby was found fully clothed.

Robbery seemed unlikely. There was money in the house that was left by the killer. According to the Concord Monitor, the police later returned over $35,000 found inside the home in cash and checks to the family. Bobby's daughter, Jennifer, said that she was aware of $26,000 in the home, presumably in cash, that was discovered by the police.

People wondered if there was any connection to the arson that had occurred the Friday before her death, October 29, 2010. Bobby and Gary owned a three-season home on Great East Lake in Acton, Maine together, described as a single-story, campy wood structure, or what Mainers would typically call a camp. Acton is due west of Portland and at the border of Maine and New Hampshire.

Though the town is large in land area, it only has about 2,500 residents. A big lake, Great East Lake, straddles the border of Maine and New Hampshire. Half of the lake is in Maine, so it sits within the town of Acton. On Friday night around 9:30 p.m., Gary's camp caught fire. It would later be determined that someone poured gasoline on it and lit a match. The fire started from the front porch.

A neighbor in Acton told the Foster's Daily Democrat that he had seen two residents leave the home earlier. He was outside cooking on his outdoor grill when he saw, quote, "flickering light at Gary's camp." He tried calling 911 but didn't have service on his phone. He got ahold of another neighbor who was able to call the fire department. But by the time they arrived, they'd grown out of control.

The heat of the fire caused the large propane tank that was sitting near the structure to overpressurize. The high-pressure emergency vent was allowing propane to escape and gave the fire department pause about getting too close. A giant pressure bomb leaking out flammable gas next to a conflagration sounds pretty dangerous. Ed Walsh, the fire chief, later said, "It made the fire a little hard to get to at first."

By the time the fire was extinguished at 2:30 a.m., it was deemed a total loss. Two firefighters remained on scene through the night, securing it until the Maine State Fire Marshal arrived. It was ruled arson. The question lingered in everyone's mind: Was the arson related to Bobby's murder that happened 48 hours later?

According to Bobby's younger sister, Chris, Jennifer called her grandmother, Madeline, the weekend of Bobby's death and told her about the fire. But she asked her not to tell Bobby. Chris and Ken both aren't certain today whether or not Bobby knew about the fire by the time of her death. The arson is unsolved today. Even if the arsonist were determined, the statute of limitations on arson would likely prevent police from bringing charges.

The time limit is six years in Maine, but if the perpetrator lives out of state, it can be extended for up to five more years. Still, 11 years from 2010 is 2021. There are other unique circumstances that could extend the statute further, but it's unlikely they'd apply here. There will never be charges brought for this crime. Police started looking into the criminal histories of all the people close to Bobby

Her son, Jonathan, has a rap sheet. Jonathan was in trouble all the time.

You know, whether it was stealing something from a friend of his or stealing cars from Gary's dealership or breaking into Bobby's place of work. And I mean, all this stuff could be substantiated. He's got a record that's a mile on, but he was always in trouble. And none of the family members, we never said anything to Bobby about it. If you said anything negative about John to Bobby, she was right on the defense. You just, you learned real quick, you know, just bite your tongue.

I know one time him and another kid, they robbed some place and they had a safe. They actually had it in the back of their Jeep. And I think the Jeep broke down and a cop pulled over to see if they needed assistance. They actually had this safe in the back of their Jeep, but the cop didn't see it. And they took the safe and they ended up throwing it into a lake in Maine. John and his buddies took the boat out. They threw the safe over. Well, unbeknownst to them, it floated.

You know, it was a steel box, but it was still full of air. And it floated. And it got recovered and they got busted for that. I know he broke into the place of business my sister Bobby was working for, one of the local companies in town. I know he broke into that place and robbed them. You know, someplace where his mother was working for crying out loud.

In 2007, at 20 years old, he was convicted of a felony-level burglary in Wolfboro. The Carroll County Department of Corrections has a record of him being in jail awaiting trial from June 5th to September 7th that year. Burglary is almost certainly an offense for which bail would likely be granted, so it's possible bail was available to him, but he couldn't make bail.

With the significant financial means of his parents, it's possible that they wanted him to remain in jail until trial. He served another day later in 2007 for, quote, disobeying a police officer. He had a restraining order against his father that expired in 2008. Things must have been tense between them. He served five days in jail in 2009 for a probation violation and an assault.

He had multiple motor vehicle infractions and a conviction for reckless driving.

Everyone in the family was aware of John's checkered past at the time of Bobby's death. But because of the optics of the situation, Gary and Bobby's acrimony, Gary's camp burning down just two days prior, the upcoming court date with $70,000 on the line, and the professional nature of the crime, they suspected Gary. But within the first six months, that perspective began to shift to Bobby's son, Jonathan.

Gary has been very, very cooperative. He has worked tirelessly with me on this, trying to figure out how to bring this to fruition. He worked right alongside the state police, but very cooperative. Definitely had an alibi. He was nowhere near the scene that night. It was not him. John got a lawyer right after Bobby's death. He refused to take a polygraph administered by the New Hampshire State Police.

He has not been cooperative with a police investigation. The state police got a search warrant to search Jonathan's home and automobiles. Guilford PD was joined by the New Hampshire State Police in applying for it. It was executed at 7.34 a.m. on Thursday, September 1, 2011, about one year after Bobby's death. That warrant is sealed, so we don't know what they were looking for or why.

But the fact that the state police were involved suggests that it has something to do with the state police investigation into Bobby's death. They discovered a .45 caliber handgun with magazines and ammo. They did not say if it was found in the car or the house. John wasn't allowed to own a firearm because of his criminal history, and he was charged with being a felon in possession. John was later arrested that morning. He made the $5,000 bail.

He was out on bail when on October 30th, nearly one year from Bobby's death to the day, he was charged with reckless driving. He was advised to turn himself in, which he did. He was later found guilty of a felon in possession charge and served quite a bit of time. Ken said that he got out after three months. But after he was released, he showed up at Gary's camp in Acton, Maine. Gary called Ken and Ken notified the police.

One of the conditions of John's release was that he wasn't allowed to leave the state of New Hampshire. He had violated those conditions, and the cops picked him up and put him back in jail. Ultimately, he was released again, but he had to wear an ankle monitor. At the one-year anniversary, the family pulled together a significant reward to try and shake something loose on the case. They offered $50,000 for information.

Following the announcement, Ken put up reward posters all around Guilford. And that's when Ken made it his personal mission to confront John about his mother's death.

We were putting reward posters all over the state, but really concentrated in the Lakes region because that's where Bobby had lived all those years. And somebody was taking them down. Now, some of them I knew were taken down by the municipalities. Places where nobody would take them down were taken down. And so I was talking with a friend of mine that's a retired sheriff. And he said, well, why don't you put a camera on one? You know, put it in a strategic place and put a camera on it.

So I did, and I put a couple of reward posters right on the road where John Miller was living. And he wasn't helping us, and I just think, well, if I put some posters up there, maybe he'll decide to help us. But anyway, I put a couple of posters on his road, and I put a camera there. The camera I put was a camera that would send pictures to my cell phone.

I actually put the camera on the ground because if I put it up in a tree I was going to get a picture of every single car that drove by too and I'd be getting pictures all day. So I put the camera on the ground and it was kind of strategic and it was looking at that reward poster that was taped to a telephone pole. Every once in a while I'd get a picture, it might be somebody walking their dog or something or

Well, my camera stopped sending me pictures and I thought that, I said, "Oh, the batteries must be going low." So I told my wife and we drove over there. And when I got there, there was a plywood sign there, big piece of plywood, you know, like four feet by four feet and written in great big letters. It said, "F.U. Kenny." You can fill in the blanks. And I knew who put that sign there. So I see the sign and it's placed almost over my camera.

and my camera's broken. It was tethered to a tree with a cable, so it wasn't easy to remove it, but it was broken. Somebody took a rock and smashed it. Well, what that somebody didn't realize was that even though they broke the antenna on the camera, it wasn't sending me pictures, but it was still taking pictures.

And the pictures it took was three pictures of John Miller. First of all, it was just a picture of him. Then you could see a rock in his hand. And then you see him with a big piece of plywood in his hand, which was the sign F.U. Kenny. So the only thing I can say about that is if somebody was putting up reward posters to find out who killed your mother, would you be taking those posters down? And would you be cursing the guy that was putting the posters up?

Looks pretty damning in my eyes. Ken looked into the possibility of filing a wrongful death suit against John. He and Gary worked together on it, hiring an attorney to look into the details. Part of their ambition was to subpoena records from the state police during the discovery process of the suit to learn more about what the police had uncovered.

But after some further legal analysis, they'd reached a dead end. It also turns out that the state of New Hampshire doesn't have to divulge any information in regards to the Right to Know Act.

There was a court case in relation to the missing person, Maura Murray, and her family filed suit against the state of New Hampshire trying to get some information, and they were denied. And then the state created a law called Murray's Exemption, where they do not have to divulge any information in regards to the Right to Know Act in what they consider an ongoing case.

It was hard to make sense of why John could have been responsible. In his own words, as reported in the Manchester Union-Leader, I always was a mama's boy and always will be. Ken remembers that Bobby was John's biggest proponent and defender. He remembered a story from John's youth that showcased Bobby's devotion.

Bobby and Gary lived in Wolfboro. We lived in Bedford, New Hampshire. We were an hour and a half apart from each other. And John came over to spend the night with my son. They were probably eight or nine years old. And around midnight, you know, he was crying and wanted his mother and wanted to call his mother. So finally we let him call and then, oh, I want to go home. I want to go home. Bobby said, well, I'm going to come get him. And I'm like,

I said, don't come get them. Just let them cry it out. No, no, no. I'm going to come get them. She jumped in her car and drove down at 1.30 in the morning and showed up to pick them up and bring them home.

Ken has been a tireless advocate for Bobby. He's been the media spokesperson for the family. He's put up billboards advertising the reward and reminding people of his sister's case. He has persistently contacted the police and the Attorney General's office. He has spoken at Senate hearings. He has offered to fund various investigative efforts and fill needs for the police, including offering to fund an independent polygraph test and a diving search operation.

He has confronted and questioned people personally about the murder. He is tenacious and dogged in his pursuit of justice. In fact, it was because of his activism that we crossed paths with Ken Dion. We attended a rally in front of the New Hampshire AG's office in Concord on Tuesday, August 15, 2023. Ken was there too, advocating for his sister and for all families who are waiting for justice in the state of New Hampshire.

Okay, you can do this. I know, I know. Carvana makes it so convenient to sell your car. It's just hard to let go. My car and I have been through so much together. But look, you already have a great offer from Carvana. That was fast. Well, I know my license plate and VIN by heart, and those questions were easy. You're almost there. Now to just accept the offer and schedule a pickup or drop-off. How'd you do it? How are you so strong in letting go of your car? Well, I already made up my mind, and Carvana's so easy. Yeah, true.

And sold. Go to Carvana.com to sell your car the convenient way. Ken is angry with the Attorney General's office. They operate in total secrecy. Any questions that families have for the AG's office are met with empty platitudes. The case is open and active, and anything shared might jeopardize the investigation.

On August 8, 2011, Ken sent a letter to the Attorney General by snail mail, asking for a brief conversation. No one from that office has ever replied. I think the family has the right to ask some questions. They certainly have the right to be acknowledged and never even got an acknowledgement. Ken's family compiled a list of about 20 questions that they had about Bobby's murder, and they got a rare meeting with the AJ's office to discuss them.

But Kent said that they refused to answer virtually any of their questions. We had lots of questions. Of course we had lots of questions. And they basically said, no, it's an ongoing investigation. We can't tell you that. And they just didn't answer anything. They're that way to this day. Basically, they say, you know, it's an ongoing investigation and they refuse to answer questions. Simple questions. They just won't answer them.

They've had a victim's advocate assigned to them over the past 13 years. But Ken believes that the name is a misnomer. In Ken's opinion, they represent the AG's office, not the victim or the victim's family. They are rarely able to reach the victim's advocate. And when they do, they have nothing to say.

When a crime like this occurs, the family is assigned a victim's advocate, and that's awarded from the state. So the victim's advocate, you would think, would be somebody that would advocate for you, to represent you, to fight for you, to...

help you. Turns out that's not the case at all. They're just a go-between between you and the AG. But anyway, we wanted to do a press release and announce this reward and, you know, kind of make a big fanfare about it. We wanted everybody to know there's a sizable reward out there. If you know something, you need to speak.

And they just couldn't figure out how to do it. We had it scheduled for Friday afternoon. And at the very last minute, they called me up and said, you know, sorry, we're not ready for this. We're going to have to postpone. And it was a pretty emotional event. I mean, my mother's involved with this. My mother at the time was 82 years old. And, you know, she's trying to find out who killed her daughter.

It's very difficult to talk about at the time. I couldn't hardly talk about it for a couple of years. And I talk about it now because I have to talk about it because if I don't, nobody's aware. And we want people to be aware that this case is out there. It's unsolved. And without the family talking about it, you know, nobody knows.

But anyway, at the time, it was very difficult to talk about. It was really emotional. But anyway, at the last minute, you know, they call us up and say, we're not prepared. No, we're not ready. And I said, what is going on? Well, we've never done this before. You're trying to tell me you've never done a press release before? But anyway, it was postponed. It did happen later on.

But what Ken is most upset about is the internal staffing problems at the AG's office. There was supposed to be a prosecutor hired to work on cold cases, and that position went unfilled for years.

So I ended up going to a public hearing one time that was a panel discussion for victims' rights. I got up and spoke at that meeting and I addressed the audience because there was a bunch of cold case victims' families in that audience. There was probably 300 people there. And I told them all that right then and there, that there was nobody in there, had not been anybody to prosecute one of their cases for the last three years.

And this was actually 2018. So it was from 15 to 18 that there was no prosecutor. After I got done speaking, the attorney general at the time, his name was Gordon McDonald. He got up to address the audience and he said, ladies and gentlemen, he said, everything this gentleman just said is the truth. We know we have a problem and we're trying to fix it.

Ken went to speak at a Senate Finance Committee meeting at the AG's request, in support of a political request to appropriate money for two cold case prosecutors and a detective. But it wasn't until early 2023 that they even filled that position. I'm biting my tongue because they look you in the eye and act like they care, and they'll tell you what they're going to do, and they do nothing.

the minute you leave the room, they have forgotten about you. You are nothing but a thorn in their side. In addition to the dysfunction at the AG's office, there is dysfunction within the Dion family too. For years leading up to Bobby's death, the two kids, Jennifer and Jonathan, didn't speak to one another. Bobby and Gary were going through a terrible divorce. Jonathan was closer to Bobby while Jennifer was closer to Gary.

At this point, Jennifer doesn't speak to Ken or Chris, or any of Bobby's siblings, neither does Jonathan. At one point, the AG's office told Ken that he was no longer the point of contact for the family, which dumbfounded him. Perhaps the AG's office was caught in the middle of a game of tug-of-war over who they should speak with about the case. There are a great many things that don't add up in this story.

Bobby reportedly had a safety deposit box at the bank. Ken believes that she had a lot of money in it. When the police went to check it, they found it empty. Who emptied the box? And where are those items? One of the unanswered questions we have is who stood to benefit the most, financially, in the event of Bobby's death.

It seems as though Gary had little to gain. The divorce was settled aside from the taxes that Bobby owed him, and it seems unlikely that Bobby's will, which we haven't seen, would have awarded him anything. Bobby's children both got an inheritance after her death. In addition to the assets she had, there was also a $750,000 annuity that matured five years after her death and was split equally between the kids.

There was an anonymous comment made on January 23, 2020, on a news article published by the Laconia Daily Sun on their website. It reads, I was an Allstate agent at the time. I met with Bobbi a week before her murder. She was concerned and wanted a $1 million life insurance policy. The appointment to discuss it with her was scheduled for the following week after her horrible death. I heard about her murder on the radio as I was driving.

If this is true, Bobby was in the midst of increasing the benefit to her children in the event of her death. They would have benefited more by waiting. According to Jennifer, both she and Jonathan had letters from Bobby of what to do in the event of her death. Bobby had met with her attorney, Jennifer Haskell, on the Wednesday before her death. She signed a new will.

When asked by the press if she believed that Bobby was in danger, she said, My personal impression was that she had reasons to be afraid, but she couldn't say any more due to attorney-client privilege. What else does she know?

According to the Concord Monitor, in July of 2012, about two years after her death, the new owners of her home on Country Club Road found a spent shotgun shell while doing yard work. They called the police, who came out and photographed and collected it. They then conducted another search of the grounds, looking for any other latent clues. Ken, at the time, said that he hadn't heard that story.

And that just speaks to the fact that people who have the most interest in Bobby's life and death are shut out. Nobody in the family has access to her email, to her phone, to her Facebook messages. What clues would Bobby's own words provide into her murder? When we met with Ken and his wife Candy in person a few weeks ago, she said that John, in the days immediately following Bobby's death, made a comment to her about Bobby that stuck with her.

He said that he was supposed to have brought some screws over to Bobby's place on Sunday afternoon, the likely day of her death, but that he'd fallen asleep, so a friend of his went over instead. Who was this friend? Would they be the last person to see Bobby alive? Bobby's sister, Chris, remembers in her first discussion with police that they showed her a man in a photo, a photo that has haunted her ever since. They asked, Do you recognize this man? She said no.

Who was that man? Ken marks every passing year with a hike that Bobby loved to do. He climbs Mount Major, a 1,700-foot peak in Alton, New Hampshire, on her birthday. It's a 3.5-mile trail that winds up the mountain with a total of 1,100 feet of elevation change. It's a popular hike. AllTrails has 6,000 submitted photos.

When you get to the top, you look out over the southern waters of Lake Winnipesaukee. The view is terrific. I can imagine Bobbie making the hike with her new dog Sport, who "wait as much as her" in the summer of 2010. Bobbie's 80-year-old mother made the strenuous hike on the one-year anniversary of her death. Some of Bobbie's ashes were scattered at the summit, and it gave her an opportunity to be with her late daughter.

It was from the base of Mount Major that the family announced the reward and the creation of a website, bobbysoup.com. It was a windy day and the family treated the reporters who gathered to some hot soup.

Bobbie, for her birthday, always asked her mom for a particular soup that she loved. Its base comes from a slow-cooked roast beef, onion, and dry spice pack. Once the roast is done, you add tomatoes, spinach, and orzo pasta. Lastly, you chop up the roast and return it to the broth. The family calls it spinach soup, or more affectionately, Bobbie's soup.

Although the website no longer exists, we have the recipe on MurderSheTold.com along with photos from Bobby's life. Her mom said that she would keep the tradition alive, saying, We asked Ken if there was anything special to remember Bobby by.

She was working on something at the time of her death. It was actually like a deer head made out of stained glass. And because of an avid hunter, we believe it was something that she may have been working on for me for a Christmas present. What we do have that is really special is a porch swing. And it was something that was in her garage. We think that maybe she was going to refurbish it.

So anyway, I took that and I refurbished it. And we have that hanging out on our front porch. We'll sit there. My mom still lives with us. We still have a place for my mother here. But we'll sit out on that porch swing in the summer mornings and have a cup of coffee and watch the sun come up. And it's just awful nice. My mother just really enjoys it. You know, it just makes you feel a little bit closer to Bobby. ♪

For more Murder, She Told, you can follow the show on TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram. A detailed list of sources, photos, and more can be found at MurderSheTold.com. I would love it if you shared Murder, She Told with a friend or recommend it on social media. A very special thanks to Ken Dion and to Chris for sharing their memories with us. Thank you to Byron Willis for his writing and research, and to Bridget Rowley and Samantha Coulthard for their research.

If you have a suggestion for a case or even a correction, you can email me at hello at murdershetold.com. I'm Kristen Sevey. Thank you for listening.