13. What motive could Byron possibly have had in committing the murder of Anastasia WitbolsFeugen?
Answer: What was Ted Bundy's motive for murder? What was Charles Manson's? People don't necessarily need a motive to kill. Sometimes they just want to kill. Byron Case just wanted to kill someone. While it is unnecessary to establish motive in a murder case, the prosecution established a reasonable one anyway.As stated during Case's trial, Byron Case killed Anastasia because (A) he had a fascination with death and wanted to know what it was like to kill someone, and (B) he despised Anastasia and was jealous of her romantic relationship with his best friend. In short, this was a "thrill killing", and Anastasia made a convenient target because of Case's dislike for her.
The fact that Case strongly disliked Anastasia was firmly established during defense testimony (and prosecutors had further evidence in Case’s own words) and was never rebutted by the defense.
Case kept a pager (cell phones were much less common in 1997) whose announcement had a specific insult directed at Anastasia. One of Case's own defense witnesses was forced to admit that fact.
In an interview with police, Case was confronted by detectives with a letter that Anastasia had written to Justin Bruton two days before her death in which she bitterly denounced Case for his interference in her relationship with Justin. In the letter she said the following:
You don't care whether I care about you or whether I love you. I don't care what Byron thinks of me. I never cared what anyone thought of me until I loved you. Then I only cared what you thought of me. Byron can go fuck himself for all I care. . . You and Byron deserve each other. Because that seems to be the one you want. Someone who shares your brain and your thinking"
Case, who kept graphic autopsy photos on his computer as wallpaper, was known by friends to be bisexual, and admitted it openly on one of his web sites, though he lied to detectives during that same interview about that fact, possibly to cover up the fact that he could have had a motive of jealousy for murder.
While Case apologists consider this motive inadequate, most who watched the trial (this includes the jury who convicted him) found it convincing.
Sources: Testimony, cross-examination, and statements of Kelly Moffett, Byron Case, and Tara McDowell, State v. Byron Case