Justice and Peace for Raymond West

The name Raymond West may not be familiar to you.  From what we know, more than 30 years after his death, Raymond appeared to be a quiet and unassuming man who lived by himself.  On August 14, 1978, a concerned friend who had not heard from Raymond and noticed some peculiarities around Raymond’s house called the police for the second time.  When they came into the house this time, they were met with a horrific, but unmistakable odor.  They smelled death.

Following a stain along the wall, running from the ceiling, the police discovered Raymond’s decomposing body in the attic.  His legs had been violently cut from his body.  Following the evidence, the police eventually arrested James Lewis, Raymond’s accountant for the murder.

Lewis was not convicted; the case never went to trial.  Evidence that the police had seized had been quashed – the evidence would not be introduced at trial – a judge ruled that the police has seized the evidence in violation of the Miranda rules.  Yes, those rules that require police to read a suspect his rights.  Adding that the Medical Examiner did not determine a cause of death, conviction did not seem likely.

So, why would this case be back in the public eye after so many years?  Sadly, it is not because anybody came forward demanding justice for Raymond.  The attention is on James Lewis. Does the interest in James Lewis have to do with his 1983 conviction on mail fraud?  No.

 Most of us remember the 1982 Tylenol deaths, when seven people died from Tylenol which had been tampered with and laced with poison.  No one was ever arrested for those poisonings.  But James Lewis, the same James Lewis, was arrested and convicted of trying to extort 1 million dollars from Johnson and Johnson to stop the poisoning.  Lewis was released from prison in 1995.  And all these years later, the Tylenol case remained not only unsolved, but somewhere just short of forgotten.

That was until February 2009 when the FBI searched Lewis’ apartment in Cambridge, Mass.  While the FBI acknowledged that forensic technology advancements may yield more clues in the Tylenol murder, they did not implicate Lewis nor explain why they searched his home; we can only speculate.  The FBI should re-open the Tylenol investigation if there is any possibility of solving it.  The victims, their families, and all of us deserve closure.

But, what about Raymond West?  There is nobody speaking for him.  Yes, someone was arrested, yet there was no conviction.  That happens.  After 30 years, do we now have greater forensic capabilities to solve that case as we may have for the Tylenol case?

Because nobody was convicted of this crime, the police department would not provide any further information and the court records were sealed.  We were able to get the Medical Examiner’s Autopsy Report.  A few questions remain:

The Medical Examiner never found Raymond’s cause of death.  Can we determine one now?

Raymond’s legs were violently separated from his body.  The autopsy reports this as “Both lower extremities have been disarticulated at the hip joint…”  Were tools or other instruments that were possibly used found at the scene of the murder?  If so, there may be DNA or other evidence that we can now test and trace.  That evidence would not be quashed.

Raymond’s body was wrapped in plastic, tape and rope.  Those materials often capture fingerprints, hair and DNA that we can now test for.  Where is all that evidence?  That evidence too will be admissible.

The autopsy report notes, “There was a black material…found to be blood or to contain blood but its exact source was not determined during the autopsy examination.  What, if anything can we determine now?

“The depressed small fractures of the skull may have been post mortem…” the autopsy stated.  Can we know for sure?

The autopsy report showed no sign of a toxicology examination.  Can one be done now?  What evidence might that yield?  

These are questions that must be answered.  Let's reactivate this investigation.

Raymond deserves closure.  Raymond deserves justice.  Raymond deserves to rest in peace.