Springfield IL: Lori Hayes Murder 10/15
Patty
Police: Lash said his acts puzzled him
Pretrial hearing held in Hayes murder case
By SARAH ANTONACCI
STAFF WRITER
When confronted with evidence linking him to the murder of Auburn
mother Lori Hayes, Dale Lash reportedly told authorities he doesn't
understand his own behavior.
"Pat, once I understand why it happened, you'll understand why it
happened," Lash reportedly told Springfield police Detective Pat Ross.
Ross was interviewing Lash and told him police had matched a DNA sample
found in the body of the brutally raped and murdered 25-year-old woman
to his own.
Up to that point, Lash had denied ever seeing Hayes - other than
spotting her picture in the newspaper after she disappeared, Detective
Doug Williamson testified at a hearing in Sangamon County Circuit Court
Thursday.
"Dale Lash said he did not know Lori Hayes and that he'd never had a
sexual encounter with Lori Hayes and that the only reason he recognized
her was because her photo was in the paper," Williamson testified.
But police have patched together a case that they say proves otherwise.
According to testimony at the pretrial hearing Thursday, Hayes was last
seen alive at Shoe Carnival, 3443 Freedom Drive, about 2 p.m. Sunday,
Aug. 1. Her 1994 white Jeep Grand Cherokee was found at 4:05 p.m.
pulled three-quarters of the way into a space at the Parkway Point 8
movie theater, about a block away. Her 10-month-old daughter, Alexis,
was screaming in the back seat and attracted the attention of passers-
by.
Police found a smear of blood on the rear bumper and more blood
spattered underneath. When officers opened the back hatch, they
discovered a large amount of blood and what turned out to be a fragment
from a .38-caliber round.
Williamson said police believe Lash had confronted Hayes somehow and
gotten into her car, traveling back roads out of the Parkway Pointe
shopping center. They believe he raped Hayes, shot her once in the back
of the head and then pulled over onto a farmer's pathway between two
cornfields on the Curran Blacktop, about a half-mile west of the Loami
Road. There, police say, Lash dragged her body 30 to 40 feet into the
field, where it was hidden by the cornstalks.
Her body was found there the next evening.
"She was shot execution-style and violently raped and injured,"
Williamson testified.
A couple shopping in the area that afternoon have told police they saw
Lash returning to the Parkway Pointe movie theater that afternoon. They
spotted his truck near the intersection of Lindbergh Boulevard and
Robbins Road.
When authorities realized Hayes had been raped, they cross-matched the
foreign DNA found on her body with foreign DNA found on the body of a
Springfield real estate agent raped last November. Police found the DNA
indicates the same person committed both crimes.
Lash was arrested in late August and charged with the rape of the real
estate agent. Police obtained blood and hair samples from Lash, and his
DNA matched the DNA found on both victims.
"We got two results with the DNA," Williamson testified Thursday,
adding that an older method of testing was used in the real estate
agent rape case and a more sophisticated test was used in the Hayes
case.
"With the old test, it proved in the billions to one that Dale Lash was
the one in the Realtor case. With the new procedure, it proved in the
trillions to one it was Dale Lash."
When police told Lash that news, he said: "I'm f---- -," according to
Williamson.
Lash pleaded innocent at the hearing to Hayes' rape and murder and to
the 1995 rape of a rental agent on Seven Pines Road. He previously
pleaded innocent to the November rape of a real estate agent on Windsor
Road.
His trial on all charges is scheduled to start Nov. 8.
Lash's attorney, public defender Brian Otwell, asked Williamson if
police had found an actual crime scene. Williamson said they consider
the place where Hayes' vehicle was found as well as where her body was
found as both being crime scenes. But he said there may be more.
There was no testimony Thursday giving the exact location of Hayes'
murder or of the rape.
Otwell also asked if any witnesses had come forward who had seen Lash
and Hayes together in the same vehicle, or if Lash's fingerprints had
been found in the car.
Williamson said that other than the couple who saw Lash driving Hayes'
vehicle, no one else had come forward. He also said fingerprint testing
has not been completed.
Otwell also pointed out that police have never found the gun that was
used to kill Hayes despite several search warrants issued for Lash's
car and home in Loami. Lash was living in Loami with a relative at the
time of the murder.
Williamson admitted police had not found a gun but that nearly everyone
they interviewed - all Lash's family and friends - said Lash was known
to carry a .38-caliber handgun in a shoulder holster. At least one
person close to Lash said Lash had carried it within a month of the
murder.
In the 1995 case, Lash allegedly used a large-blade knife to threaten
the apartment rental agent before raping her. DNA evidence collected
after her Dec. 29, 1995, rape also matched Lash, Williamson testified.
He added that police had found two knives matching the one the victim
described. One was found in Lash's car and the other at the home he was
living in in Loami.
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