Smart Case, July 30, 2002

07/30/02 | Jolly Green

[Jolly Green]

Time Line
06/05/01	Tuesday	Ricci steals items from the Smart home while he is employed there as a handyman. Ricci is charged in July of 2002 of 1 count of theft related to the Smart incident.
05/30/02	Thursday	~ Ricci returns to pick up his Jeep at the auto repair shop before the shop has a chance to fully fix it He tells the repairman that it needed for an emergency.
06/04/02	Tuesday	~ Ricci is at work from about 9am to 5:30pm ~ Ricci claims he spends the evening with friends
06/05/02	Wednesday	~ 1:05am - 2 cars are spotted on the SLC Shriner's Hospital Parking Lot by a hospital security guard, two blocks from the Smart residence ~ 1:30am (approx) - Elizabeth is kidnapped from her home ~ 1:30am - Ricci claims to be in bed asleep with his with wife. ~ Ricci is scheduled to be off work all day today. ~ 7:21am - Rachel/Amber alert is issued and national media is involved. ~ 8:30am - Ricci and his neighbor talk about the kidnapping of Elizabeth, Ricci seems to know too much information about it. ~ Sometime during this day Ricci is visited by police in regards to Elizabeth's kidnapping as reported by Angela Ricci (Richard A. Ricci's Wife which is an ex-convict herself) ~ Ricci is seen by his neighbor digging a hole by his (Ricci's) trailer early in the morning. (heard the neighbor say this on TV)
06/06/02	Thursday	~ Ricci is scheduled to work from 9am to 5:30pm today, but instead works from 10:30am to 7:00pm ~ Police talk to Ricci this day about the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping. (The media is reporting this, so it could be wrong)
06/08/02	Saturday	~ Ricci returns the Jeep to the repair shop to get it fixed. The Jeep is muddy and the repair shop owner sees Ricci remove seat covers from the back of the jeep and place them into a plastic garbage bag that already contains other stuff in it. Also the repair shop owner said a muddy post hole digger was in the back of the Jeep, Ricci removes this also. Ricci has a man waiting across the street to give him a ride. Ricci takes the plastic bag and contents along with the post hole digger with him. Also there is 500 to 1000 extra miles on the Jeep since Ricci picked it up on May 30th, 2002.
06/14/02	Friday	~ Ricci is taken into custody for a parole violation, this being drinking while on parole and association with other ex-cons.
07/11/02	Thursday	Formal charges are filed against Ricci (2 counts of theft & 1 count of burglary) on the theft & burglary of the Smart neighbors home which occurred in April 2001, and 1 more count of theft for stealing from the Smart home on June 6th, 2001.
Special thanks to Brigette for starting this timeline.

[L84AD8]

Hello again!

Thanks for the welcome!

I wondered if I could suggest an additional entry to the Ricci time line? Ricci was charged with entering the home of a neighbor of Ed Smart's on April 1, 2001, and taking various items. He confessed to burgling the Smart house on June 5, 2001.

The irony of the date is that the June 5, 2001 burglary is exactly one year prior to the kidnapping of Lizzie. I'm not sold on the idea that Ricci did kidnap Lizzie, but it is ironic.

I'm going to post the info for the neighbors' robbery and leave off the http, so the link doesn't come up automatically! So add it, if you want to visit the site?


://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/crim/utricci71102adamsinf.pdf

Thanks!

[IamHD]

I came across this article. Article is a couple of years old, but interesting to say the least, and I hope that they have checked this out. Anything is possible.

The Province September 22, 2000

The Province Article

Polygamists scoop teens
Girls allegedly being wed to elders of church
with communes in U.S., B.C.

by Fabian Dawson

A secretive commune in southern B.C. is part of a U.S. probe into the arranged marriages of under-age American girls to priests of the polygamous community.
Lenore Holm and her husband, Milton with nine of
their children. Daughter, Nicole, 16, was not shown.
She was married off to a 39-year-old man with 10 children.

On Friday, Utah's State Attorney appointed a special prosecutor to investigate allegations of child abuse and teen brides in the 30,000-member Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which has communes on the Utah-Arizona border and in the Kootenay town of Lister.

(Winston) Blackmore

The arranged marriages are on the rise because the church's leader had predicted that the end of the world is near and that only those in "celestial pairings" will be saved.

Prosecutor Ron Barton has been contacted by ex-members of the church and by a child advocacy group to investigate the movement of young girls between Arizona, Utah and B.C.

The Bountiful commune in Lister has between 800 and 1,000 members and is run by popular local businessman Winston Blackmore.

Blackmore, 44, estimated to have 30 wives and 80 children, is the commune's bishop, newsletter editor, chief executive officer of its businesses and trustee of its property.

He is also the superintendent of the commune's taxpayer-funded school, which indoctrinates its 184 students to keep "sacred secrets."

Blackmore, who has refused to talk to The Province, decides who marries whom and where they live. Most of his wives are younger than his eldest son, who is 24.

Ex-members told The Province that several of his wives are American teens.

Last year, he married several new wives, including a 16-year-old American girl identified as Lorraine Johnson, who was a neighbour and schoolmate of Nichole Holm, also 16, of Colorado City, Ariz.

Her mom, Lenore Holm, told The Province yesterday that the church wanted Nichole to be the second wife to a 39-year-old man with 10 children.

When the mother refused consent, she was promptly declared a "tool of the devil" and, within minutes, excommunicated.

Six months ago, Nichole was paired off with her "chosen husband" at the Utah- Arizona border and whisked to the Bountiful commune in the Creston Valley near the B.C.-Idaho border.

Holm filed a police report in Colorado City last week alleging that her daughter was married in violation of state laws and taken to B.C. She also plans to file an official complaint with Creston RCMP this week.

"I am praying . . . I want my daughter back," Holm said from her home in Colorado City.

"She called me recently and said I was wicked."

Nichole returned to Colorado City a few weeks ago, but is being kept from her mother by other church members. The church has told the local authorities that the teen has run away from her home.

Jay Beswick, who represents For Kids Sake, a California-based international non-profit group against child abuse, said: "We believe there are between 30 and 40 under-age girls who have been married off to church elders and members in B.C. and the U.S. over the past two years."

Beswick, who has contacted FBI officials on the movement of minors across national borders, says the girls are between 13 and 16.

Church elders in Utah have denied the allegations, calling the claims the work of "apostates who distort the facts."

The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, also called the United Effort Plan, broke away from the Mormon Church and openly practices polygamy.

In most cases, the first wife is registered and the others married by bishops in secret weddings under a strict code of silence.

In 1992, B.C. announced it would not prosecute two polygamists from Bountiful and declared the Criminal Code section outlawing polygamy unconstitutional.

In 1993, Immigration Canada confirmed it was looking at U.S. women being brought into the commune from Utah and Arizona. But because of the conflict of legal opinion between Ottawa and Victoria, no action was taken.

At that time, the teens in question had already given birth to a total of eight children and were stepmothers to 20 others.

[L84AD8]

Opps, I forgot to add this. Has anyone posted this? It is the developement that Tom Smart and his relative Zeke Dumke are putting together. It is southwest of SLC. I would guess that that is where Tom is moving to, after his house sells.

http://www.wintertonfarms.com/news/

[L84AD8]

Opps, I forgot to add this. Has anyone posted this? It is the developement that Tom Smart and his relative Zeke Dumke are putting together. It is southwest of SLC. I would guess that that is where Tom is moving to, after his house sells.

www.wintertonfarms.com/news/

[sandude]

As far as what Sandude wrote, I do not think he was directing his comments to me.

I was not directing anything towards you Brigette. I know that you have gone to great lengths to show your disapproval of those who bash the Smart family and their religion. I am very interested in this case and I come here and to your forum to keep up with what's happening. I appreciate all that you do in this regard. I think that Jolly shares my frustration as to the direction this forum goes in at times. I think he posted my comments so that others will see that he is not the only one that feels this way.

As for your theory about a "Mr. Big", I think that it is possible that the abduction was carried out as a money making scheme by Ricci and associates. We know that Richard was digging with his post hole digger before returning the jeep. Was he burying a body or perhaps some money from the sale of Elizabeth? Either way, he would not want to fess up to where he had been. If he buried Elizabeth, then it's the death penalty for him. If he buried a significant amount of money he would have no compunction to share that with LE either because that would implicate him in the abduction and could also lead to the death penalty. Why did he bury the loot? Because of the intense scutiny that he was coming under. If it was money that was buried, then his best bet would be to try to ride it out and hope that he could someday either be released or break out of prison to recover his booty.

Now that I've said this, I also believe that it's just as plausible that this was a kidnap for ransom gone bad. In either case poor Elizabeth may no longer be with us or worse yet she may be trapped in some unthinkable slavery or pornography situation. My greatest hope is that she is alive and being held by a man who only wishes to hear her harp playing whenever he wishes. I know, sounds too much like the movies.

I'm sure that the SLPD/FBI are checking out every known associate of our handyman crew. That would include anybody who has hired them in the past. If there is a Mr. Big then we have to make a connection between him and the Ricci boys. This is probably beyond our ability to sleuth here in the FreeRepublic. We can only speculate at this time. Let's hope that Ed Smart is right and there is something coming this week that will help solve this mystery.

[Bella]

Picture of Uncle Tom's $1.12M house for sale now posted here

I wonder why he didn't list it with Ed's real estate office/company..

[Bella]

By "perp" did you understand him to mean the actual abductor?

yes

[Bella]

I realize that you have limited resources, BUT Ricci was trusted in the Smart home and one or more other homes in the neighborhood for several months UNTIL the theft of the Smart home. No one in the neighborhood had any idea about Ricci's criminal past and Ricci is known to be a smooth talker. Nice try, but you are going to have to do a lot better than that.

Since when is any con trusted?? Whether the people knew the truth or not, he's still not a trusted member of anything--he's has a record and is a con!

[cookiedough]

Hey, I don't want to be President! I'm still getting over the shock of having to wear bifocals! :-)

[cookiedough]

Okay, "person" ... I stand corrected. I would not consider temporary hired laborers to fall into the category either. YMMV, obviously does. :-)

[Neenah]

We know that Richard was digging with his post hole digger before returning the jeep. Was he burying a body or perhaps some money from the sale of Elizabeth?

You are telling us, that Richard is going to dig a grave with a POST HOLE DIGGER?????

How long would it take to dig a grave with this ?

The only other kind of Post Hole Digger, would be a Hydraulic Digger, or Tractor mounted digger, or a huge one like they used to get the miner's out of the Mine the other day., and I don't think that would fit in a Jeep.

And I don't think there would be electrical hookups for a powered Post Hole Digger.(unless it was gas powered..but at any rate..it is only going to dig a 6 inch hole !!)

[Iwo Jima]

Try trifocals. Try contacts AND glasses.

[Iwo Jima]

Are those geraniums and petunias that I see?

[Neenah]

I think that Jolly shares my frustration as to the direction this forum goes in at times. I think he posted my comments so that others will see that he is not the only one that feels this way.

Was he burying a body or perhaps some money from the sale of Elizabeth?

The forum sure goes in strange direction at times.

[Neenah]

...and, there is music playing in the background.

[stlnative]

Wow Neenah... That looks like an old post hole digger. Probably worth some money. The kind I had in mine was the 2 handle type where force it in the ground and spread the handles apart to lift the dirt out.

[Jolly Green]

And I don't think there would be electrical hookups for a powered Post Hole Digger.(unless it was gas powered..but at any rate..it is only going to dig a 6 inch hole !!)

Unfortunately, your opinions are limited by your post hole digger. There are other/better models that make digging holes much more efficient - holes of any size or depth. There utility is that they can snatch a good clump of dirt and remove it - vertically or horizontally. While a post hole digger doesn't compare to a back hoe for digging a grave, it certainly would be better than just a shovel.

[Iwo Jima]

If the "brains" of the operation is attempting to bury a body with a post-hole digger, that must be a "Pinky and the Brain" type of brain! (Are you thinking what I'm thinking?)

Why do you think that some people on this thread have such an emotional need to have Ricci be the stop and start of the crime? What is the damage to their world view or "sense of life" if it turns out that someone influential was the origin of this crime? Why do they care so much about whose ox is gored?

Please enlighten me because I am perplexed by the downright vicious attacks on people who conclude that someone other than Ricci must be behind this. It's almost like we are talking about Lee Harvey Oswald and the assasination of JFK.

Looking forward to your insights.

[stlnative]

Anyhow using the old kind or the new kind would take forever to did a grave with. But would be good for bury money!

[Iwo Jima]

That's old? That's the kind I have. When did that get old?

Maybe whenever I did.