Grand Haven — Investigators followed more than 250 tips and came to MSU in an attempt to consider all motives behind a the slayings of four people, including MSU student Katherine A. Brown.
None of the 250 tips led to the arrest of 31-year-old Troy Brake, who is now being tried in Ottawa County’s 20th Circuit Court for the killings, the case’s lead investigator Thomas Knapp said at the trial Thursday.
Prosecutors spent Thursday leading jurors through the steps taken in the investigation process that culminated with Brake’s arrest. Investigators testified they sifted for days through the burnt and blackened debris within the Zimmer home.
Brake’s attorney, Paul McDonagh, challenged the investigation process, asking Knapp to detail the steps he took to continue the investigation after pursuing Brake as a suspect.
Brake is being tried for the deaths of Brown, 18; her boyfriend, Jeremy Zimmer, 20; Zimmer’s brother Tyler, 17; and his mother Sharmaine Zimmer, 52. All were found dead in the Zimmer’s Wright Township home Sept. 29, 2008.
“We exhaustingly looked at all victims and all leads they might have had,” Knapp said at the trial.
Knapp said investigators were assigned to look into the backgrounds of each victim, leading an investigator to MSU to conduct interviews and look into Brown’s previous relationships. Knapp said all tips and background research led to dead ends.
“No investigation was stopped until we concluded we could not proceed any further,” he said.
John Schurman, a detective from Ottawa County Sheriff’s Department, testified he found a bullet in the Zimmer’s basement, which was sent to Michigan State Police for testing. Evidence found at the scene included shell casings, Schurman said.
The shell casings were examined by two investigators who testified in Thursday’s trial. The two experts said their examination of the markings on the shell casings indicated they were fired from a gun seized from Brake’s property.
McDonagh questioned each expert on the scope of his evaluation and on the reliability of the tests.
“This is reliable,” said one of the experts, Detective Lt. Jeffrey Crump of the State police, who is the firearms unit supervisor with a crime lab in Grand Rapids. “Anyone testing will get the same answers and they are the right answers.”
The other expert witness, independent firearms expert David Balash, said his results agreed with Crump’s findings and the casings match the gun found on Brake’s property.
“I am absolutely positive of my results,” he said.
The trial is expected to last three weeks.
Check the print edition of The State News and statenews.com for more updates.
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