Some of Byron Case's supporters, including his mother, claim to believe that his arrest and arraignment for the murder of Anastasia WitbolsFeugen were a total surprise, that he had never been a suspect until the time that he was accused of the murder by his ex-girlfriend. During the investigation, the killer himself occasionally told a few acquaintances that he had never been a suspect, but it is a fact that he was a suspect from the time data was gathered on the case, and that he was acutely aware of early on.

He was one of the last three people seen with Anastasia on the night of her murder; he was asked directly by JCSD Detective Gary Kilgore on July 29, 1999 ¹ whether he killed Anastasia, and he had already admitted in an email to Anastasia's family on May 2, 1998 ² that he already knew he was a suspect in Anastasia's murder. He admitted under oath during his trial that he had known for a long time that he was a likely suspect in the investigation.³

Long before that, he was resisting JCSD's requests that he come in for further interviews, having only given one interview two days after the murder.⁴ a friend of his gave a statement to police a few days after the killer himself had,⁵ but the friend had little information to give to police about Anastasia that would help the investigation; his only apparent purpose in being interviewed and making a statement was to help support the killer's alibi efforts.

In short, even if Case had not been the murderer, it was obvious from his behavior that he was aware that he was a suspect from the first moment he heard the news, being one of the last people to have seen Anastasia alive, and having been directly asked by a police detective if he was the killer. He was a suspect in the murder from the very beginning, and he was aware of that fact from the very beginning.