Adam Emery | |
---|---|
Born | Adam C. Emery November 10, 1962 |
Disappeared | November 10, 1993 Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island |
Status | Missing for 30 years, 10 months and 22 days |
Occupation(s) | Purchasing agent and worker in a plastics company |
Spouse | Elena L. DiRocco Emery |
Conviction(s) | Second-degree murder |
Criminal charge |
Adam C. Emery (born November 10, 1962, disappeared November 10, 1993, declared dead 2004) was an American fugitive. On November 10, 1993, he was convicted of second-degree murder in the death of a twenty-year-old man in a road rage incident in Rhode Island. Before formal sentencing, Emery disappeared from the Claiborne Pell Newport Bridge just hours after being released on bail. He was declared legally dead in 2004.
On the evening of August 31, 1990, Adam Emery's 1985 Ford Thunderbird was sideswiped by a passing vehicle while he and his wife, Elena, were at a Rocky Point restaurant with another couple. [1] Enraged, Emery mistakenly chased down the wrong car, and stabbed the driver to death with a military knife. The murdered driver was twenty-year-old Jason Bass. The other passenger was 20-year-old Joshua Post. Emery was subsequently released on bail after spending 8 months in jail while his lawyer negotiated putting up money and property as bail. Emery was offered a plea deal in exchange for lesser charges of Voluntary Manslaughter and a prison term of five to seven years, but he refused to accept the deal, insisting that the killing was in self defense. [2] Analysis conducted using paint chips from both vehicles determined that someone else had hit Emery. [1] [3]
On November 10, 1993, Emery was convicted of second-degree murder, and was to await formal sentencing. Emery was facing up to 25 years in prison for the murder, but hadn't been formally sentenced. [4] Emery was released on bail once again, and subsequently disappeared hours later, along with his wife; they both mailed suicide notes, and their car was found abandoned on the Claiborne Pell Newport Bridge. [4] Prior to their disappearance, the couple were last seen at a Burger King and purchasing wearable exercise weights at the Kelly's Sporting Goods store in Cranston, Rhode Island. [5] [6] In 1994, a skull later identified as Elena's was found in the Narragansett Bay below the Newport Bridge the same day, coincidentally, the houses put up as Adam Emery's bail were being repossessed. [4]
In 2004, Emery was declared legally dead; however, there have been multiple sightings of him and in 2010, the FBI placed him on their most wanted list. [7] They believe Emery may have travelled to Florida or Italy and have stated they have "no reason" to believe Emery is dead. [8]
Numerous sightings of Emery were reported in Connecticut in the month following his disappearance, but Emery was still legally free, and thus could not be considered a fugitive. The day before Emery's scheduled formal sentencing, the FBI received a tip that Emery may have fled to Florida. [9] The sightings after this followed geographic patterns, starting in Florida, and then later France and Italy. [10] The FBI believes Emery is most likely in Italy, as he has family there. The FBI has worked with Italian authorities regarding these sightings, but none have led to any conclusions. In 2019, the FBI said that there was a "significant chance" that Emery would be tracked down within the next five years. [10]
Emery was profiled on television programs Unsolved Mysteries and America's Most Wanted .
Claiborne de Borda Pell was an American politician and writer who served as a U.S. Senator from Rhode Island for six terms from 1961 to 1997. He was the sponsor of the 1972 bill that reformed the Basic Educational Opportunity Grant, which provides financial aid funding to American college students; the grant was given Pell's name in 1980 in honor of his work in education legislation.
A fugitive or runaway is a person who is fleeing from custody, whether it be from jail, a government arrest, government or non-government questioning, vigilante violence, or outraged private individuals. A fugitive from justice, also known as a wanted person, can be a person who is either convicted or accused of a crime and hiding from law enforcement in the state or taking refuge in a different country in order to avoid arrest.
Herbert Claiborne Pell Jr. was a United States representative from New York, U.S. Minister to Portugal, U.S. Minister to Hungary, and a creator and member of the United Nations War Crimes Commission.
James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. was an American organized crime boss who led the Winter Hill Gang, an Irish Mob group in the Winter Hill neighborhood of Somerville, Massachusetts, a city directly northwest of Boston. On December 23, 1994, Bulger fled the Boston area and went into hiding after his former FBI handler, John Connolly, tipped him off about a pending RICO indictment against him. Bulger remained at large for sixteen years. After his 2011 arrest, federal prosecutors tried Bulger for nineteen murders based on grand jury testimony from Kevin Weeks and other former criminal associates.
Donald Eugene Webb was an American career criminal wanted for attempted burglary and the murder of police chief Gregory Adams in the small town of Saxonburg, Pennsylvania on December 4, 1980. It was only the second murder in the town's nearly 150-year history; the first murder occurred in 1842.
Joseph Patrick Lombardo, also known as "Joey the Clown", was an American mobster and a high-ranking member of the Chicago Outfit crime organization. He was the Consigliere of the Outfit.
A presumption of death occurs when a person is believed to be dead, despite the absence of direct proof of the person's death, such as the finding of remains attributable to that person. Such a presumption is typically made by an individual when a person has been missing for an extended period and in the absence of any evidence that person is still alive—or after a shorter period, but where the circumstances surrounding a person's disappearance overwhelmingly support the belief that the person is dead. The presumption becomes certainty if the person has not been located for a period of time that has exceeded their probable life span, such as in the case of Amelia Earhart or Jack the Ripper.
The Jamestown Bridge was a cantilever truss bridge that connected Conanicut Island to mainland North Kingstown, Rhode Island, spanning the West passage of Narragansett Bay. The bridge first opened to traffic in 1940, replacing ferry service as the primary connection for the town of Jamestown, situated on Conanicut Island. It was constructed for just over $3 million 1940 USD, which was paid for by tolls until June 28, 1969. With a total length of 6,892 feet, the Jamestown Bridge was the third longest in Rhode Island at the time of its destruction, ranking behind its replacement, the adjacent 7,350-foot Jamestown Verrazzano Bridge, and the 11,248-foot Claiborne Pell Newport Bridge connecting Conanicut Island to Aquidneck Island and Newport. The Jamestown Bridge was closed to vehicular traffic on October 8, 1992, and its main span was destroyed through a controlled demolition on April 18, 2006.
The Colombo crime family is an Italian-American Mafia crime family and the youngest of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City within the criminal organization known as the American Mafia. It was during Lucky Luciano's organization of the American Mafia after the Castellammarese War, following the assassinations of "Joe the Boss" Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano, that the gang run by Joseph Profaci became recognized as the Profaci crime family.
Harold Paul Rico was an FBI agent, indicted for murder in 2003. He was accused of the 1968 framing of four men for murder but died before his trial would have taken place.
Francis Patrick Salemme, sometimes spelled Salemmi, also known as "Cadillac Frank" and "Julian Daniel Selig", was an American mobster from Boston, Massachusetts who became a hitman and eventually the boss of the Patriarca crime family of New England before turning government witness.
Helen Marie Brach was an American multimillionaire widow whose wealth had come from marrying into the E. J. Brach & Sons Candy Company fortune; she endowed the Helen V. Brach Foundation to promote animal welfare in 1974. Brach disappeared on February 17, 1977, and was declared legally dead, as of the date of her disappearance, in May 1984. An investigation into the case uncovered serious criminal activity associated with Chicago horse stable owners, including Silas Jayne and Richard Bailey. More than a decade later Bailey was charged with, but not convicted of, conspiring to murder Brach; he eventually received a sentence of 30 years after being convicted of defrauding her.
Glen Stewart Godwin is an American fugitive and convicted murderer who was added to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list on December 7, 1996, nine years after he escaped from Folsom State Prison in Folsom, California, where he was serving a 26-years-to-life sentence. He replaced O'Neil Vassell on the list. However, he was dropped from the list on May 19, 2016.
A faked death, also called a staged death, is the act of an individual purposely deceiving other people into believing that the individual is dead, when the person is, in fact, still alive. The faking of one's own death by suicide is sometimes referred to as pseuicide or pseudocide. People who commit pseudocide can do so by leaving evidence, clues, or through other methods. Death hoaxes can also be created and spread solely by third-parties for various purposes.
Melanie Hall was a British hospital clerical officer from Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire, who disappeared following a night out at Cadillacs nightclub in Bath. She was declared dead in absentia in 2004.
Adam Joel Anhang Uster was an entrepreneur and real estate developer; he was murdered at the intersection of Calle San Justo and Calle Luna in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico in September 2005. He was leaving the Pink Skirt Nightclub/Dragonfly Club with his estranged wife, Áurea Vázquez-Rijos, from whom he was finalizing a divorce, and was knifed and beaten to death on the street, while she suffered minor injuries during the attack. The event was highlighted as the Pink Skirt Murder in a television exposé on Dateline NBC. Vázquez-Rijos, known in the media as the "Black Widow", fled jurisdiction to Italy in 2006 but was discovered and extradited to Puerto Rico in 2015, and was convicted of being a co-conspirator in her husband's murder in October 2018.
The Hunt with John Walsh is an American investigation/documentary series that debuted on CNN on July 13, 2014. The series is hosted by John Walsh. The second season premiered on July 12, 2015, and the third season premiered on June 19, 2016. The fourth season premiered on CNN's sister station, HLN, on July 23, 2017. A successor to the show, In Pursuit with John Walsh was announced in early 2018. It premiered in January 2019 on Investigation Discovery.
On January 2, 2018, 19-year-old University of Pennsylvania sophomore Blaze Bernstein was killed after leaving home to meet an acquaintance at a park in California. Authorities later charged his former high school classmate Samuel Woodward with the murder, declaring that the incident was a hate crime.
Jennifer Dulos was an American woman who went missing on May 24, 2019. Authorities believe that she was killed in an attack at her home in New Canaan, Connecticut, United States. Her estranged husband, Fotis Dulos, and his girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, were arrested on charges of tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution in connection with Jennifer's disappearance. Later, the two – along with Fotis's attorney Kent Mawhinney – faced additional charges related to Jennifer's murder.
Ashley Nicole Summers was 14 years of age when she disappeared near her home in Cleveland, Ohio in early July 2007. Her whereabouts remain unknown, as there have not been any verified sightings of Summers since her disappearance.