FBI sifts Mich. land for clues to Hoffa location

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FBI sifts Mich. land for clues to Hoffa location
Teamsters leader vanished in 1975; tantalizing tips have failed to pan out

MILFORD TOWNSHIP, Mich. - The FBI on Wednesday searched property northwest of Detroit for clues to the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa, officials said.

The Teamsters leader was last seen in July 1975 at a restaurant in Oakland County’s Bloomfield Township.

Agent Dawn Clenney, a spokeswoman for the FBI in Detroit, said the bureau was executing a search warrant in Milford Township, about 35 miles west of Detroit.

Investigators are looking for “evidence of criminal activity that may have occurred under previous ownership” on the property, Clenney said.

Asked if they were looking for Hoffa’s remains, she said, “Could be,” but declined to comment further.

Reporters were not allowed on the property, described by local media as a horse farm. Images shot from news helicopters showed about a dozen people, some with shovels, standing by an area of newly turned dirt about 10 feet by 15 feet.

‘We felt we needed to follow up’
Clenney said the bureau receives numerous leads about Hoffa and “this was one we felt we needed to follow up on.”

In May 2004, authorities ripped up the floorboards of a Detroit home where Frank Sheeran, a one-time Hoffa ally, had claimed he shot Hoffa to death. But no evidence of Hoffa was found.

The claim related to the infamous, unsolved killing was included in a book published months after Sheeran died in 2003 at age 83.

A New Jersey mob hit man who died in March reportedly made a similar deathbed claim. Richard “The Ice Man” Kuklinski gave author Philip Carlo what he claimed were graphic details of Hoffa’s killing, The Record of Bergen County, N.J., reported.

“The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer” is scheduled for release in July.

Oakland County Prosecutor David Gorcyca said Bloomfield Township police were offering assistance but that he knew little about the latest search.

Some of the 85-acre site is now an industrial development, but interest is highest in an area that is now, and was at the time of Hoffa's disappearance, a farm.

Process may take weeks
FBI agents and evidence specialists are surveying the land and using probes and other equipment to help determine the best place to start digging, which they hope to begin doing Thursday. But the area is large, and the operation may take several weeks.

The fate of Hoffa has for years been a source of speculation. Hoffa was declared legally dead in July 1982.

A number of theories have been advanced on his whereabouts, including that Hoffa was buried in the end zone at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., under the New Jersey Turnpike or under various plots of land in New York and New Jersey.

Earlier this year, Lynda Milito, author of a tell-all book about her husband's life in the Gambino crime family, said Hoffa was killed by her husband and dumped near the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in New York City.

NBC News’ Pete Williams and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12841274/from/RS.3/

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Interesting.............

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FBI: Strong clue in search for Hoffa’s remains
Agents in Mich. look for remains of Teamsters leader who vanished in 1975

MILFORD TOWNSHIP, Mich. - For 31 years, Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance has spawned endless theories about his whereabouts.

Now the FBI is investigating another as it searches a rural horse farm outside Detroit after receiving a tip agents call the best they’ve had since the former Teamsters boss went missing.

“This is the best lead I’ve seen come across in the Hoffa investigation,” said Daniel Roberts, the agent in charge of the Detroit FBI field office.

Agents aren’t saying exactly what they know, but they plan to spend up to two weeks trying to find out if the body of Hoffa, who was last seen in July 1975, is hidden somewhere on Hidden Dreams Farm.

On Thursday, the FBI mobilized dozens of agents, cadaver dogs, demolition experts and archaeologists and anthropologists. The agency suggested it may remove a barn.

Skepticism
Neighbors were skeptical of the search.

They’re not going to find anything,” said Mark Weidel, 32, who grew up hearing rumors that Hoffa’s remains were buried the farm.
Investigators began combing the area Wednesday, and the search intensified Thursday with the use of heavy construction equipment.

The farm, which is about 30 miles northwest of Detroit, comprises three barns and 43 stalls on 65 acres of fields and woods. It was previously owned by Hoffa associate Rolland McMaster.

As horses galloped in a fenced field and their owners led them in and out of the barns, a backhoe was at work and about a dozen agents searched the farm’s perimeter for clues.

A quarter-mile of media vehicles lined the nearby roadside, and eight television satellite trucks vied for parking spots.

“You can see from the amount of FBI and police department personnel out here that this is probably a fairly credible lead,” Roberts said.

Asked about McMaster, he said, “We have heard that name as well,” but wouldn’t comment further.

The Detroit Free Press, citing people involved with the case who declined to be identified because of the active investigation, reported the tip that led to the search came from 75-year-old Donovan Wells, a former associate of McMaster who was sentenced two years ago to 10 years in federal prison in a marijuana smuggling scheme.

McMaster’s lawyer, Mayer Morganroth, said he doubted the FBI would find anything. “That farm was looked at with a fine-toothed comb in the ’70s, when Hoffa was missing,” he said. “There’s nothing there.”

Morganroth said FBI officials visited McMaster, 93, this week at his home in Fenton, where one of several horse-breeding farms he owns is located.

“They were just asking about the farm itself — did he ever get any inkling?” he said.

Morganroth said McMaster was in Indiana on union business at the time of Hoffa’s disappearance, and that to his knowledge, his client was never a suspect.
Mystery swirls around fate
Hoffa was last seen on a night he was scheduled to have dinner at a restaurant about 20 miles from the farm. He was supposed to meet with a New Jersey Teamsters boss and a Detroit Mafia captain, both now dead.

Over the years, Hoffa’s disappearance spawned endless stories — that he was entombed in concrete at Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands; that he was ground up and thrown to the fishes in a Florida swamp; that he was obliterated in a mob-owned fat-rendering plant that has since burned down.

In 2003, authorities searched beneath a backyard pool a few hours north of Detroit but turned up nothing. The following year, they pulled up the floorboards on a Detroit home and found bloodstains, but the blood was not Hoffa’s.

A law enforcement official in Washington said the latest search was based on information developed several years ago and verified more recently.

Among other things, there was a high level of suspicious activity on the farm the day Hoffa vanished, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. A hoe appeared that day near the barn organized crime members had used for meetings, and that location was never used again, the official said.

Investigators have long suspected Hoffa was killed by the mob to keep him from reclaiming the Teamsters presidency after he got out of prison for corruption.

In 1967, Hoffa went to jail, sentenced to 13 years for jury tampering and fraud, but he refused to give up the Teamsters presidency. After he quit the job in 1971, President Nixon pardoned him.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12841274/

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Hunting for Hoffa: High tech, low hopes
Scientists say finding long-dead Teamsters boss is a long shot

WASHINGTON - Clues to Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance three decades ago could be buried in the pastures of a Michigan horse farm, but scientists said investigators face plenty of obstacles in finding the remains of the former Teamsters boss.

As the search went into its sixth day Monday, forensic anthropologists who have worked on similar searches and excavations said federal agents have plenty of modern tools at their disposal: ground-penetrating radar, electromagnetic surveying devices and DNA testing if Hoffa’s remains are found.

But more than 30 years have passed, and the Milford Township farm about 30 miles (48 kilometers) northwest of Detroit is on dozens of acres of fields and woods, they said.

What’s more, skeptics question whether Hoffa’s remains are even at the farm: Mayer Morganroth, an attorney for Rolland McMaster, a former Hoffa associate who once owned the farm, said they both believe nothing will be found there.

But officials have said it’s a good lead. Investigators have brought in earth-moving equipment, cadaver-sniffing dogs, and anthropologists and archaeologists from Michigan State University.

Painstaking work
Scientists stressed that the work is painstaking, requiring the team to strike a balance between properly combing the land without destroying evidence.

“This is going to be more like an archaeological scene than a crime scene,” said Jay Siegel, director of the forensic and investigative sciences program at the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis School of Science.

William Bass, professor emeritus of forensic anthropology at the University of Tennessee, said that when he first saw news footage of investigators sticking probes into the land, it told him “whatever evidence they have is not very specific.”

The shaftlike probes allow investigators to search for soft spots in the soil that might indicate the outline of a pit, but Bass said more precise information would have prompted authorities to erect sheets to block public view and begin the process of excavation.

A hastily dug grave would leave subsoil above the topsoil and indicate changes in the dirt’s color, Bass said.

Looking for traces
Most soft tissue would have decayed by now, but scientists said a skeleton or bone fragments could be used to conduct DNA testing to determine the identity. Other clues could still be in a burial pit: any clothing made of synthetics, a leather belt or shoes probably would remain intact, the scientists said. Careful excavation also might uncover footprints at the bottom of the pit, Bass said. In some cases, he has found cigarette butts in a grave — probably from nervous abductors.

“If you have just kidnapped Jimmy Hoffa and you’re trying to get rid of him, you’re worried,” Bass said.

Barring an obvious bullet wound, scientists would have to determine whether any marks or signs of injury on skeletal remains came from the natural course of his life or foul play — a very tricky exercise.

Steven Symes, a professor of forensic anthropology at Mercyhurst College in Erie, Pa., said that after three decades there is less chance of identifying signs of foul play.

But at the same time “the good trauma analysts can actually figure out what happened to that person,” he said. “There could be good evidence.”

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12919189/from/RS.5/

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Much ado about nothing’ at Hoffa dig site
Forensics experts, cadaver dogs arrive at Mich. farm, find nothing of note

MILFORD TOWNSHIP, Mich. - A man in a hard hat leading the dig for Jimmy Hoffa's remains stopped a backhoe from digging Thursday afternoon at a suburban Detroit farm and jumped in a hole.

An FBI evidence technician joined him as other agents put up yellow crime scene tape and grabbed shovels and bright green buckets. All eyes were fixed on the hole beneath where a barn once stood on the horse farm.

After a little more digging, two cadaver dogs entered the hole and quickly emerged. After a lot of discussion, the backhoe resumed excavation on the ninth day of the FBI's renewed search for Hoffa.

Crews dug for at least seven hours Thursday on the farm, which was once owned by a Hoffa associate. Dawn Clenney, a spokeswoman for the FBI in Detroit, said nothing significant was found.

"Much ado about nothing," Clenney said Thursday afternoon. She said the search was expected to continue through the Memorial Day holiday weekend.

Digging may be completed Friday
But Bill Koresky, whose company was hired by the FBI to knock down the barn and dig beneath it, predicted in a telephone interview Thursday night with The Associated Press that digging would be complete on Friday.

The searchers used a backhoe to peel away the earth at the spot where they had removed a layer of concrete and asphalt that had been the barn's floor.

The digging was stopped at 1 p.m. when a university professor who is leading the work noticed a change in the color of the dirt and a piece of what looked like rotted wood, said Koresky, co-owner of Able Demolition of Sterling Heights.

"You'll see the color will be different, I don't care if it's 70 or 80 years" since the land was disturbed, said Koresky, who ran one of the excavation machines at the site on Wednesday and Thursday.

Cadaver dogs were sent into the hole but turned up nothing significant, Clenney said.

Digging resumed and lasted for a total of about seven hours at the Hidden Dreams Farm, about 30 miles northwest of Detroit.

Koresky said that before stopping for the day, crews had dug a 50-by 40-foot hole that was 3 1/2- to 4-feet deep. A trained eye, he said, can tell whether the dirt has been disturbed by digging to that depth.

The 100-by-30-foot barn was torn down Wednesday, its pieces trucked off to a landfill as the FBI continued its efforts to solve the 30-year-old mystery of Hoffa's disappearance. All that was left was the barn's 200-square-foot, 4-inch-thick floor, which was removed by a 75,000-pound excavation machine Thursday morning.

Farm once owned by Hoffa associate
The farm once was owned by a Hoffa associate and is located not far from where the former Teamsters chief vanished in 1975. No trace of the Hoffa has ever been found, and no one has been charged in the case.

A government investigator said last week that Donovan Wells, who lived on the land at the time, was the one who gave the FBI the tip that has sparked the intense effort to solve a legendary mystery.

Wells' lawyer, Joseph J. Fabrizio, has said his client told the FBI in 1976 that he saw suspicious activity on the farm around the time of Hoffa's disappearance.

The investigator said that Wells wasn't that forthcoming 30 years ago and that he recently passed a polygraph exam. The investigator is familiar with the current dig and spoke on condition of anonymity because some of his information comes from records that have been sealed by a federal judge.

Another former lawyer for Wells, James Elsman, has said Wells said he actually saw a grave being dug with a backhoe. Elsman said that based on what Wells told him in 1976, he could pinpoint the location.

Hoffa last was seen on a night he was scheduled to have dinner at a restaurant about 20 miles from the farm. He was supposed to meet with a New Jersey Teamsters boss and a Detroit Mafia captain, both now dead.

Over the years, Hoffa's disappearance spawned endless theories — that he was entombed in concrete at Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands; that he was ground up and thrown to the fishes in a Florida swamp; that he was obliterated in a mob-owned fat-rendering plant that has since burned down.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12957019/

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Hoffa search unearths a creepy cupcake

Hoffa search unearths a creepy cupcake
Bakery’s dirt-nap dessert; doctor gears up on eBay; stick-shifters’ Web site

As FBI agents combed a Michigan farm looking for the remains of labor leader Jimmy Hoffa this week, a local bakery has decided to capitalize on the search with a cupcake apparently not only grave-digger can love.

Cupcakes aren't usually a best-seller at the Milford Baking Company. But since the addition of a plastic green hand emerging from the chocolate-flavored sprinkles and frosting meant to resemble dirt, the bakery can't make enough of the desserts.

As dozens of FBI agents, police and others invaded Milford Township, a small community 30 miles northwest of Detroit, more than 500 of the 95-cent cupcakes have been sold, with orders coming in from all over the Detroit area. One businessman even waited outside the bakery at 5 a.m. so he could treat co-workers, and an FBI agent ordered three dozen to take to those working at the dig site, co-owner Laura Helwig said.

The Hoffa cupcakes are the best single-day seller ever at the bakery, Helwig said.

The bakery has ordered an additional 700 green hands with the expectation that demand will remain high. The FBI has said the search, which began May 17 at the Hidden Dreams horse farm, is expected to last a couple of weeks.

"I never dreamed it would take off like this," Helwig said. "We're just trying to have fun with the whole thing."

We just hope no Sopranos-looking characters stop by to see if they can get a piece of the action.

Not-so-bad ideas

A British surgeon decided to bypass standard operating procedure when he decided to purchase essential medical equipment from the Internet auction site eBay, a hospital has admitted.
Dr. Kevin Murray had already ordered nearly $85,000 worth of equipment to set up his new operating room at the James Paget Hospital in Norfolk, according the the Daily Telegraph newspaper in the U.K.

But he forgot to order a surgical retractor, an essential item which holds wounds open during operations.

So in order to save time, he bypassed official channels and bought the retractor off eBay.

When hospital management discovered the purchase, the device was confiscated before it was used during surgery.

But after being checked and sterilized it has been returned to Dr. Murray, the hospital said.

Roy Haynes, director of human resources and operations at the hospital, said the instrument posed no threat to public health, which we're sure has patients feeling much better.

One of the best uses of the Internet is the technology's ability to draw together people who share unique or even obscure interests, and one Web site operator thinks he's found profitable niche: People who drive cars with manual transmissions.
"The human love affair with the automobile was born out of a yearning to take control and be free, and that is embodied in the very act of shifting," says Greg Bruder, manual transmission lover and founder of Shiftyworld.com.

Bruder notes that manual transmissions account for around 10 percent all cars sold in the United States and Japan. "Trends now indicate that manufacturers want to eliminate the traditional manual transmission in new cars and trucks," says Bruder. "Action now can prevent that looming extinction from happening."

And for only $19.95 a year, Shiftyworld members can band together to promote their clutch-popping passions, trade transmission tips and "read and/or post unforgettable and often humorous member stories of driving a stick shift."

We think that section of the site should be called Shift Happens.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12975168/

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Officials To Stop Digging For Jimmy Hoffa's Remains

Agents, Digging Crews Find No Trace Of Teamster Leader

POSTED: 11:35 am EDT May 30, 2006

Officials have announced they will stop digging for Teamster leader Jimmy Hoffa after finding no trace of his remains.

A tip from federal inmate Donovan Wells led FBI agents from Detroit, Chicago and Washington, D.C., to a barn in Milford Township.

Wells told police Hoffa's body was buried on the property over 30 years ago. A digging crew was brought out to the site. The crew remained on location at the barn for nearly two weeks.

Police and agents said that Wells' tip was the strongest they have received since Hoffa's mysterious disappearance in 1975.

The dig is slated to end Tuesday.

Stay with Local 4 News and ClickOnDetroit.com for the latest information.

Previous Stories:
May 25, 2006: Possible Suspicious Discovery Made Under Milford Barn
May 24, 2006: Barn Demolished At Hoffa Search Site
May 24, 2006: Barn Will Be Demolished In Search Of Hoffa
May 22, 2006: Tipster's Lawyer To Speak To FBI In Hoffa Search
May 18, 2006: Digging Continues In Hoffa Probe
May 17, 2006: Tip Leads FBI Agents To Dig For Hoffa


Copyright 2006 by ClickOnDetroit.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


www.clickondetroit.com

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Thanks for the article Heidi.