Murder In Tonawanda, NY

I occasionally write about crime. This is my input on a very controversial and high profile murder that happened not far from here. Please remember that all my information is from what I have read in the news.

Tonawanda is a northern suburb of Buffalo, NY, that is not usually known for crime. On February 17, 1993, a woman named Deborah Meindl, age 33, was brutally murdered in her home, which was in the older section of Tonawanda not far from the Niagara River.

She had been stabbed many times, severely beaten, and strangled with one of her husband's neckties, which was still around her throat. A bloodied steak knife was found at the scene. It was a chaotic scene that appeared to have been a burglary.

Two men were convicted of the murder and spent a long time in prison, but their convictions have always been controversial. It was decided that they were burglarizing the house and killed Deborah Meindl when she arrived home. The murder took place in the afternoon. The victim arrived home sometime after 2 PM . Her young daughter arrived home just after 3 PM and found her body.

The house is an unlikely candidate for a burglary. They were a simple couple, she was a nursing student and her husband the manager of a fast food restaurant. They had two young daughters. There was no indication that they had much money or valuable possessions, and no sign that they were involved in anything like drug dealing.

The house is in a densely populated residential neighborhood and the murder took place in the afternoon, near the time that parents would be picking children up from school. People might have noticed someone walking, and carrying stolen goods, or a car parked near the house. The possibility of burglary was also complicated by the fact that there was snow on the ground, so that a burglar risked leaving footprints in the snow.

The two that were convicted were, at worst, petty thieves, and neither had shown any tendency to do anything like this. It didn't look anything like Deborah Meindl was murdered after having surprised burglars. The murder was overkill in the extreme. It looked far more like a crime of passion, where there was a lot of emotion involved.

Not only was it dramatic overkill, she had been severely beaten, stabbed countless times with the steak knife, and strangled with her husband's necktie. She was also found handcuffed, along with the tie still around her throat.

What this definitely looks like is a targeted killing, initially set up to look like a burglary. The first reaction is that her husband, or someone who had access to handcuffs, had committed the murder and arranged it to look like a burglary. But that would be just too obvious. Both the necktie and the handcuffs are false clues. It was designed to look like a crime of passion, that was set up to look like a burglary. 

Deborah Meindl's husband was cleared and there is no reason to believe that it is the work of a serial killer.

Now let's go to another story. Possibly the most famous native of Tonawanda is named Richard Matt, although not for a good reason. Richard Matt is famous for the prison escape that transfixed New York State in June of 2015. Matt, along with another prisoner named David Sweat, broke out of the Clinton Correctional Facility by cutting their way into a steam pipe, and from there into the town of Dannemora's storm drainage system. 

They emerged through a manhole cover a block outside the prison wall. After searching the Adirondacks for nearly a month Richard Matt was shot and killed and David Sweat was wounded and recaptured.

The manhole through which the two escaped is in the foreground, and the prison wall in the background. Image from Google Street View.

Richard Matt was in prison for committing a brutal murder. In 1997 Matt and an accomplice broke into the home of Matt's former boss, in neighboring North Tonawanda. They believed that the former boss had a lot of money in the house, and demanded to know where it was. 

The boss was bound with duct tape and shut in the trunk of the car. The two drove around for more than 24 hours, to Ohio and back, with him in the trunk and Matt stopping periodically to beat him. Matt finally killed him by snapping his neck. They hid his body on industrial Tonawanda Island, before returning later to cut it in pieces and throw the body parts in the Niagara River.

After committing this murder Richard Matt fled the area and managed to get across the border into Mexico. In a bar Richard Matt saw an American man and thought that he had a significant amount of money. In attempting to rob the man Matt stabbed him numerous times, killing him. Matt was caught and convicted and spent nine years in a Mexican prison. 

When Mexico extradited a drug dealer to the U.S. they put Matt on the plane as well. He was then convicted of the 1997 murder of his former boss. In Clinton Correctional Facility his cell was next to that of David Sweat. The two became friends and eventually made their famous escape, which ultimately ended with Matt being shot and killed and Sweat wounded and recaptured.

Now back to the murder of Deborah Meindl. When she was brutally murdered Richard Matt was living a few minutes walk away. From what I have read a witness saw a young man walking up the driveway of the house. Richard Matt would have been 26 at the time.

After his recapture, with Richard Matt dead, David Sweat wrote a long letter to the news claiming that Richard Matt had told him that he killed Deborah Meindl. The letter described details of the crime that Matt allegedly told him.

What is happening here now is that the convictions of the two men for the murder have been overturned. They are to be given new trials. But the local judicial establishment is very resistant to the idea that Richard Matt might have committed the murder.

How would David Sweat know details about this murder if Richard Matt hadn't told him? David Sweat is from the other end of the state, the Binghamton NY area, and was 12 years old when Deborah Meindl was murdered. I cannot see that he had ever been to the Buffalo area.

David Sweat has little to gain for helping to solve a crime. He killed a police officer by shooting him and then purposely running him over with a vehicle. He was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. Then he made his famous escape, which thoroughly embarrassed the prison system and cost the state more than 20 million dollars. There is no way he will ever get paroled from prison, even if he does help solve a crime.

Look at the similarities between Richard Matt's two known murders and the murder of Deborah Meindl, in 1993. The murder of Matt's former boss took place in 1997, and the murder of the American man in Mexico in 1998.

Richard Matt broke into his former boss's house just as the murderer of Deborah Meindl broke into her house.

Richard Matt restrained his former boss with duct tape and by locking him in the car trunk just as Deborah Meindl's murderer had restrained her with handcuffs.

Richard Matt brutally beat his former boss just as Deborah Meindl had been brutally beaten.

Richard Matt snapped his former boss's neck just as Deborah Meindl had been strangled with the tie.

Richard Matt stabbed the American man that he was trying to rob in Mexico many times just as Deborah Meindl had been stabbed with the steak knife many times.

This most definitely points toward Richard Matt.

For more postings about crime see  the postings on this blog "The Unsolved Crimes Of Rochester, NY" March 2023, "The Unabomber And The Zodiac Killer " June 2023, "Toronto's Billionaire Murder Mystery " December 2022. Some of the sections of the compound posting "Investigations" December 2018, are also about crime. Section 50) is about the prison escape of Richard Matt and David Sweat.