After some questions arose about Bill’s whereabouts in the days following Maura Murray’s disappearance (based on cell phone roaming charges), I heard from one of his West Point professors, Bob McDonald.
Here’s what McDonald says:
I was with him for all that time. My wife and I arrived late Friday
and checked into the Wells River Motel, which is where everyone was
staying. If my memory is correct (not a 100% certainty given that 14
years have passed) my wife drove home on Monday (it was a three day weekend) but I was able to get colleagues to cover my classes and didn’t head home until — I think — Wednesday.
That last day Bill and I drove to UMass and met with campus police;
afterwards he drove me to Springfield (or maybe it was Worcester), where
I rented a car and drove home.
Bill basically didn’t leave my side. While my wife was
with me, he slept in his parents’ room. After my wife left, he moved
over to mine. There were times when he’d go to the motel office to do
phone interviews with Greta Van Susteren, etc., but other than that I
don’t remember us being apart. I wish I had a better memory of NH and VT
geography and place names. The first day or two I was there (Saturday and maybe Sunday)
we searched in the general vicinity of the crash site. We visited the
tourist town near Mt. Washington and also went to a few other towns both
in the direction in which she was traveling (into NH) but also in the
opposite direction (toward VT) since, if she got picked up, we weren’t
sure in which direction the car was traveling. We were posting fliers,
talking to people in convenience stores and food markets, and trying to
get her picture and police contact info out there. We went to UMass on
my last night up there to meet with campus police and also to get me a
car rental so I could drive myself home. I hated to leave. Bill stayed
up there for a while longer.As the days passed the
focus shifted from searching near the site of Maura’s crash and talking
to people who lived nearby to trying to do everything possible
(distributing fliers, speaking to the media) to raising awareness that
she was missing and getting her photo out there in the hope that someone
had seen her.I’m not 100% sure how to explain
the 4-minute call. Maybe he was trying to access her voicemail (I
think I remember her voice mail being something all of us discussed, but
can’t remember if we had access to it right away, later, or ever), or
maybe he was just leaving a long message in hopes that she would get it.
I’m guessing that the period in which he didn’t use his cell is
explained by the fact that coverage up there was so lousy back then. He
was using the hotel phone to speak with media and others in the evenings
and during the daytime we were either searching or driving around
passing out and posting fliers
Interesting because his records show only one phone call from him to Channel 7, unless of course any calls incoming that we can't possibly track down now were them calling him first, that would be odd. Furthermore, none of this explains Maine and why in some spots you would have been driving literally wild all over New England with no apparent direction? I am sorry, but if you had this alibi for him all this time WHY WAIT UNTIL NOW
He says he was with him "all of that time." My impression is that "that time" in terms of your thinking, James, starts on Wednesday, with Bill's arrival in Haverhill. McDonald, however, says that he arrived on Friday. So …. alibi for Wednesday and Thursday?
First reports were that he was there on Wednesday. Those could be errors, of course. But it seems possible that this represents a change to “I’m not vouching for what happened Wednesday and Thursday.”
He said he and his wife arrived on Friday. Maura went missing in a Monday. That’s nearly 4 days that he was not with Bill if I’m not mistaken