GIANNI and JOSEPH MCSTAY - 4 and 3 yo - San Diego County CA/MEXICO alerted

Joseph McStay's Father Has Theories About Who Murdered Then Buried Family In The Desert


Patrick McStay and his son Joseph McStay, whose body was recently found in the desert (Family photo)


The father of Joseph McStay is speaking out—in vague terms—about the three people he suspects might have been responsible for the murders of his son, his daughter-in-law and their two children.

Joseph's father Patrick McStay told CBS, "I have exhausted and have so much information on three possible persons of interest. All have a motive."

The three individuals are not connected to each other, but all of them seem like likely candidates. Patrick says one of them seems to be a particularly likely suspect: he's a wealthy man with a long rap sheet that includes charges of attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon and burglary. McStay says he, too, has a motive for killing his son.

The McStay family had been missing since 2010, and authorities had few clues about what happened to them until their bodies were found in the desert on the outskirts of Victorville earlier this month. San Diego sheriff's investigators said it was their most extensive missing persons search ever, but the McStay family has been critical of the investigation, calling it "botched" and "inept."

The last trace of the McStays was the family car found just near the border of Mexico. But the family says they were always particularly skeptical of investigators' theory that the family crossed over into Mexico without telling any family members.

McStay says he suspects that whoever killed Joseph, his wife Summer and their two boys Gianni, 4, and Joseph, 3, was likely hired to do the job or the children recognized the killer. McStay told CBS, "To kill a child is something totally different. You have to be a cold-blooded killer."

McStay says that while he hoped he would see his son and family again, his worst fears came true: "I knew there was more to this. I knew they didn't walk away."

Contact the author of this article or email tips@laist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Emma G. Gallegos in News on Nov 19, 2013 5:50 PM

Time and site of McStay memorial set


5:33 p.m.Dec. 16, 2013


Plans for a public memorial and paddle-out for the slain McStay family have been set.

The memorial will be at noon Jan. 4 at the Vineyard Community Church in Laguna Niguel, followed by a paddle-out at the San Clemente Pier at 2 p.m.

The Fallbrook family had been missing since February 2010. Their remains were found Nov. 11 in two shallow desert graves north of Victorville.

Authorities have not released a cause of death for Joseph McStay, 40, his wife, Summer, 43, and their sons, Gianni, 4, and Joey Jr., 3.

Memorial plans were announced on mcstayfamily.org, a blog run by Joseph’s brother, Mike McStay.

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/dec/16/Mcstay-memorial-set-church-paddle-out/

McStay murder mystery: Who is Vick Johansen?


Posted: Dec 18, 2013 7:44 PM EST Updated: Dec 19, 2013 8:59 AM EST


By David Gotfredson, Field Producer -
Video Report By Phil Blauer, Anchor/Reporter -


 

Vick Johansen: Undated Facebook photo (left); 2013 Mono County Jail mug shot (right)

• Related Stories
  
• McStay Family Murdered: Related Stories, Videos & Links
  

SAN CLEMENTE, Calif. (CBS -- Before Joseph and Summer McStay and their two sons, Gianni and Joey, Jr., went missing from their Fallbrook home in February of 2010, the family lived in the beach community of San Clemente.

The remains of the family of four were discovered buried in the desert near Victorville last month. No one has been arrested and no suspects have been named.

Summer Martelli met Joseph McStay in 2004, when she lived with her boyfriend in the Southern California mountain community of Big Bear Lake.

The boyfriend, an ex-marine named Vick Wyatt Johansen, had purchased the Big Bear home – located at 796 Conklin Road – in 2002 for $226,000, property records show.

Email records obtained by McStay family members indicate that Summer met Joseph McStay and became pregnant with their first son, Gianni, while she was living in Big Bear in 2004.

Johansen added Summer's name to property records associated with the Big Bear Lake home in January 2005. He quit claimed the home to Summer Martelli one year later in January 2006.

Court records reveal Johansen made criminal threats against a neighbor and her 12-year-old daughter in 2004, while Johansen was living in Big Bear with Summer Martelli.

The neighbor, who requested that she not be identified, wrote a description of the 2004 incident in a restraining order declaration obtained by CBS News 8:

On April 20, 2004 I was standing in front of my dining room window facing my driveway when I saw a person with bleached blonde hair pass by and head for my back yard. I went to my sliding window off of my living room and opened the door to see this defendant walking up on my patio deck. He started taking off a dog run leach that he loaned us months ago. It was hooked around two trees next to my deck. As he was up on my patio deck to take the cable off of the trees he was looking at me yelling, "I am going to kill your son" over & over & over. And then said, "I am going to kill you and your daughter." I told him that my son doesn't live here anymore and he said, "You better stay away from my house." As he was going to the other tree to finish taking down the dog run he was shaking a 1 ½ foot metal pipe and yelling, "I am going to kill you, your son and your daughter. I was a Marine and I know how to kill." As he was leaving my back yard he was still yelling, "I am going to kill you, your daughter, and your son" over & over.

In the court papers, the neighbor also described another alleged stalking incident involving Johansen:

My daughter and her two friends were walking down our street and when they walked pass (sic) Vick Johansen's house. He walked out with his dog and followed the girls very closely. As the girls got scared and walked faster, he also walked faster. The girls called me on their cell phone and they were crying & shaking because they were frightened that Vick was going to hurt them. My son went into the Marine Corps at Camp Pendleton – San Diego, CA. Now my 12 year (old) daughter and myself are alone in our house and have to fear that Vick Johansen might keep coming by our house and harassing us. Or he might follow my daughter again while she walks by his house on her way to and from school.

Big Bear Lake sheriff deputies arrested Johansen on April 20, 2004 and he was charged in San Bernardino Superior Court (case # MBV25296) with one misdemeanor count of making criminal threats.

Johansen, at the time age 27, pleaded no contest to the misdemeanor charge on May 5, 2004 and received probation.

The judge ordered Johansen to attend a 24-week anger management program and served him with the restraining order to keep him away from his neighbor and her children. He was given credit for six days already served in jail.

On June 29, 2004, a judge issued a bench warrant for Johansen's arrest when he failed to enroll in the anger management program, according to court minute orders obtained by CBS News 8. Probation was reinstated on Aug. 12, 2004.

Another bench warrant was issued on Sept. 30, 2004 when Johansen failed to appear in court. Probation was reinstated again on Nov. 30, 2004.

Johansen completed the anger management program on Dec. 15, 2004, according to a report filed with the court.

Over the years, Johansen kept in contact with Summer McStay, even after her marriage to Joseph McStay and the births of their sons, Gianni and Joey, Jr., according to family email records.

"He also swore up and down that she was his soul mate and that she was going to bear his children; and no on else was going to bear his children," said Patrick McStay, Joseph McStay's father.

Johansen wrote this email to Summer in September 2005:

Summer, I am sincerely happy for you and your family, I am proud of you. I assure you I am a true friend of your family. You can still call me if you ever need help with anything. Don't forget about me, I am still out here. I genuinely care about your well being, and all those that you love. Friendship can be the most beautiful of true love. The trials of life will always reveal the truth. I believe in you Summer. Don't forget. I truely (sic) believe in you. Knowing you're out there gives me faith in the world. Knowing that you are blessed with a child shows me that you're beauty is blossoming into the world. All of my heart goes out to you. Summer Girl Forever….........

He also wrote this email on Dec. 23, 2009, six weeks before the family's disappearance:

I love you for ever.. Happy Birthday Summer.. for ever and ever.. -Vick

To Patrick McStay, the fact that Summer had an old boyfriend contacting her via email was reason for concern.

"Well, he's got a violent background," said Patrick McStay, referring to Johansen's criminal threat conviction.

"If I'm a cop, I'm going to look at this guy seriously. I'm going to run down everything I can about him. Where was he? What was he doing? Who's he associating with? What's going on?" said Patrick McStay.

As it turns out, Johansen had moved from Big Bear Lake to San Clemente by the time the McStay family went missing.

At 1:10 a.m. on Jan. 10, 2010, deputies arrested Johansen on charges of interfering with a business and resisting a peace officer, after he refused to leave the OC Tavern, according to an Orange County jail booking record.

The OC Tavern -- located at 2369 S El Camino Real, San Clemente – is directly next door to an office building that Joseph McStay had leased to operate his fountain business, Earth Inspired Products.

At the time of Johansen's arrest, however, it appears McStay had already moved out of his office at 2377 S El Camino Real, Suite A.

Johansen gave Orange County deputies his address -- in the 200 block of Avenida Lobiero in San Clemente -- when he was booked into jail for the 2010 arrest. The address is about two miles away from the San Clemente home that Joseph and Summer McStay had rented prior to their move to Fallbrook.

The resulting misdemeanor complaint charged Johansen with one count of interfering with a business. "Defendant unlawfully refused to leave the premises of the business establishment after being requested to leave by the owner's agent," the charging document said.

Johansen pleaded guilty. He was sentenced to one year probation, given credit for three days in custody, ordered to stay away from the OC Tavern, and was required to provide a DNA sample, the court records said.

CBS News 8 has been unable to reach Vick Johansen for comment because currently he is incarcerated in the Mono County Jail in Bridgeport, Calif.

Officers arrested Johansen in October on a vandalism charge for allegedly breaking out a door window of a bar in Mammoth Lakes.
A Mono County Superior Court official told CBS News 8 that Johansen, 36, is known as a transient veteran in the small, mountain community.

Johansen's criminal history in Mono County includes a felony vandalism conviction in August 2011, when he destroyed an $800 computer during an altercation with roommates; and a misdemeanor disturbing the peace conviction in June 2013, when he threatened a teller at a Bank of America.

His probation was revoked in July 2013 when Johansen allegedly returned to the same Bank of America branch in violation of a court order.

In 2011, Patrick McStay had urged San Diego County Sheriff Department detectives to investigate Johansen's background; one of many leads they failed to follow, according to the elder McStay.

"The problem with all of this is the San Diego Sheriff's Department never bothered to look into any of this," said Patrick McStay.
Sheriff's officials defended their work in the days following the discovery of the McStay remains, saying a team of detectives spent countless hours on the case.

"We looked at bank records, phone records ... we never stopped investigating the case, never," San Diego Sheriff Spokeswoman Jan Caldwell said.

The murder investigation now has been turned over to the San Bernardino Sheriff's Department.

http://www.760kfmb.com/story/24256729/mcstay-murder-mystery-who-is-vick-johansen

ladibug wrote:I've found quite a few different stories about this tragedy.  Below is a snip from an article that has a lot to say about the family having been in debt, financial problems a few months before, etc. but no documentation for this info.  The snip part says the neighbor's video only captures about 18" of the bottom of their Isuzu so it gives the time but not "how" they left their home.  Joe's phone call was about 40 min. after they left.

Monday, Nov 18 2013 3AM Daily Mail UK


SNIP:  "Strangely Summer had several different aliases including Summer Martelli, Summer McStay and Lisa Aranda Martelli. She was actually christened Lisa Virginia Aranda.

The couple had only bought their new five-bedroom home in Fallbrook about two months earlier, leaving their apartment in San Clemente. They were both licensed real-estate agents and purchased it out of foreclosure for about $320,000.

Apparently they planned to renovate the property, sell it for a profit and move back to the coast.

Later on the Thursday they disappeared Summer made plans to meet her sister Tracy. Interestingly she then used the home computer to search for homeopathic anger management medication.

At 7:47 p.m., a neighbor's surveillance camera captured the bottom 18-inches of what appears to be the family's white Isuzu Trooper going by. About 40 minutes later, on his cellphone, Joseph called a co-worker.

That is the last known contact between the family and the outside world.

On February 10, Sheriff's deputies went to the house for the first time after Chase Merritt called to report that Mr McStay was not responding to phone calls or emails. The deputy knocked on the door, but left after seeing nothing suspicious.

Three days later Mr McStay's brother Mike came over and climbed through an unlocked window. The family's beloved dogs were still there, which baffled Mike, but he tried not to assume the worst...."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2508766/Mystery-McStay-money-Family-dead-barely-afford-rent-despite-100k-bank.html#ixzz2ky53G6Df

This turns out to have been lies which makes me suspect the brother of McStay.

McStay Family remembered in Orange County



SAN CLEMENTE, Calif. – Those who knew and loved the McStay Family from Fallbrook gathering in Orange County on Saturday to remember the lives of Joseph and Summer and their two young sons Gianni and Joseph Jr..

“We’re here to comfort the family,” said family friend Peggy Rodriguez. “This is not the outcome they thought would happen.”

After a service at the Vineyard Community Church in Laguna Niguel, mourners gathered for a paddle out in San Clemente. Before moving to Fallbrook, the family lived in Dana Point and made regular visits to the San Clemente Pier.


In the surf and on shore, family and friends celebrated four lives lost far too soon.

Last November, the bodies of all four family members were discovered in the desert of San Bernardino County. The McStays had been missing since February 2010.

Although some closure comes with the memorial and paddle out, the question of who killed the McStay Family still remains.

http://fox5sandiego.com/2014/01/04/those-who-knew-and-loved-the-mcstay-family-from-fallbrook-gathering-in-orange-county-on-saturday-to-remember-the-lives-of-joseph-and-summer-and-their-two-young-sons-gianni-and-joseph-jr-we/#axzz2pVXGCLSv

Family of McStays still waiting for answers

By Teri Figueroa
9:01 p.m.Feb. 1, 2014

FALLBROOK — For four years, relatives of the McStay family have waited.

First, to learn where the missing Fallbrook family was.

And since November, when the bodies of Joseph McStay, wife Summer and their two young sons were found buried in two shallow graves north of Victorville, they’ve waited to find out who killed them. And why.

San Bernardino County sheriff’s detectives took over the case from the FBI and San Diego County Sheriff’s Department but have refused to discuss the investigation publicly since announcing on Nov. 15 that the bones a motorcyclist discovered four days earlier were those of the missing family.

Relatives of the McStay family said detectives have asked them to remain silent on the investigation, too.

“I don’t want to jeopardize the case. I want to do what they asked me to,” Tracy Russell, Summer’s sister, said last week.

The four-year anniversary of the family’s disappearance is Tuesday. The couple and their two boys, Gianni, 4, and Joey Jr., 3, vanished from their Fallbrook home on Feb. 4, 2010.

Four days later, before anyone knew they were missing, their Isuzu Trooper was towed as an abandoned vehicle from a San Ysidro parking lot near the U.S.-Mexico border crossing.

Joseph McStay was 40 at the time, and Summer, 43.

For three years, San Diego County sheriff’s detectives handled the case, chasing down leads, including ones that suggested the McStays may have gone to Mexico. Last April, they turned the investigation over to the FBI in San Diego.

But a break in the case came on Nov. 11, when a motorcyclist off-roading near Victorville called 911 to report finding bones.

“Hi, uh, I’m out here behind the dump, and I found what looks like part of a human skull,” the unidentified caller said to a California Highway Patrol dispatcher.

After determining the caller’s location, the dispatcher transferred the call to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, which had jurisdiction.

The CHP made public its portion of the call in January. San Bernardino County sheriff’s officials have declined to release their portion.

Four days after the bones were discovered, San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon said at a news conference that the bodies uncovered in shallow graves were that of the McStays, and that the deaths were being investigated as homicides. He would not say how the family was killed, and the autopsies remain sealed.

San Diego County sheriff’s investigators immediately turned over their files and evidence — even the Isuzu — to sheriff’s homicide investigators in San Bernardino County.

“We talked with them at length in the beginning,” San Diego County sheriff’s spokeswoman Jan Caldwell said Thursday. “Now they are working hard on their own.”

Caldwell said local investigators stand ready to offer assistance if needed.

Joseph’s father, Patrick McStay, said he has not spoken to detectives in more than a month, but they have told him they planned to reinterview people and “start back at square one.”

Rick Carlson, a retired San Diego police homicide detective who is not associated with the McStay case, said that San Bernardino County detectives will “have to play catch up from all the information that San Diego provided.”

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/feb/01/mcstay-family-fallbrook-sheriff-investigation/

Who killed the McStay family?


By Randi Kaye, Jessica Small, Melissa Dunst Lipman and Dana Ford, CNN
updated 10:34 AM EDT, Tue June 3, 2014



STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Joseph and Summer McStay, and their two boys, vanished from home in February 2010
  
• Their bodies were found in the Mojave Desert nearly four years later, buried in shallow graves
  
• From the start, the case has baffled investigators, but they aren't giving up
  
• "I could have probably hired some Boy Scouts and done a better job," says Joseph's father
  

For the latest on the McStay murders, watch "Buried Secrets: Who Murdered the McStay Family?" Tuesday, July 1, at 9 p.m. ET on CNN.


Victorville, California (CNN) -- Four years ago, Patrick McStay lost everything he loved.

His son, Joseph, his daughter-in-law, Summer, and their two little boys -- Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr., 3 -- vanished.

"From Day One, I just had this gut feeling that I was never going to see them again," he said, swallowing tears. "I just knew. Something told me, I wasn't going to see them again."

The McStays disappeared from their home in suburban San Diego in February 2010.


Who killed the McStay family?

There were no signs of a struggle. No apparent plan to flee.

Nearly four years later, the mother, father and two boys were found slain in the Mojave Desert -- their bodies buried in shallow graves.

How did they get there? Who killed them?

From the beginning, the case has baffled investigators, but they aren't giving up.

Said John McMahon, sheriff of San Bernardino County, in an exclusive interview with CNN: "It is certainly my hope that at some point in the future, we'll be able to solve this, and bring the suspect or suspects to justice."

McStay's brother to killers: 'You guys are cowards'

The disappearance
February 4, 2010, began as an ordinary day in the McStay home in Fallbrook, a community of about 30,000 people about 18 miles from the Pacific Coast and 50 miles north of San Diego.

Patrick McStay spoke on the phone with his son, who ran a custom water feature business, and was scheduled to have a lunch meeting around noon. Summer McStay spent the day caring for the kids and overseeing the family's home renovation.

They were looking forward to their youngest son's birthday party that weekend.

But that night, the family of four suddenly left the house -- the doors locked, the car gone. Inexplicably, their two beloved dogs were left outside without food or water.

"(It's) as if you took off really fast but were coming back," said Susan Blake, Joseph McStay's mother, who is divorced from Patrick McStay.

"Your thoughts are going wild. 'Well, why would they be missing?' Something's not right here," she said.

The investigation
Early evidence pointed investigators south.

Four days after the McStays disappeared, detectives say the family's white Isuzu Trooper was parked and subsequently towed from a parking lot just steps from the Mexican border.

And the car wasn't the only clue.

After they found the Isuzu, investigators discovered someone at the McStay home had done a computer search for getting passports to Mexico. They also found surveillance video showing a family of four matching the McStays' description crossing on foot into Mexico on February 8.

"I just thought, well, maybe they took off," said Joseph's mother.

But his father wasn't buying it.

"I said right up front, the first time I saw it (the surveillance footage), it wasn't them," said Patrick McStay, adding that Summer was afraid of Mexico.

"Would Summer take her two children in there? Heck, no," he said.

Missed opportunities
Patrick McStay worried detectives were chasing dead-end clues.

"I could have probably hired some Boy Scouts and done a better job," he said.

He reached out to Tim Miller, founder of the nonprofit search-and-rescue organization Texas Equusearch, which, in turn, contacted freelance investigative journalist Steph Watts for help.

One point that raised questions for Watts was the last known call from Joseph McStay's cell phone. The call was to a friend, Chase Merritt. It came in about 40 minutes after a neighbor's security camera captured the family's Isuzu pulling out of the McStay's cul-de-sac. Merritt didn't answer.

Among those questions, Watts said, were, "Did Joseph actually make that call from his phone, or did somebody else take Joseph's phone and make that call? Was he trying to call for help?"

The journalist also noted the impact of the delay in reporting the family missing to law enforcement.

Joseph's brother contacted authorities 11 days after the McStays disappeared. He says he waited because he didn't want to overreact, and thought the family might just be on vacation.

"The first few hours are so critical, the first few minutes ... The beginning of someone trying to commit a crime against you, that's the only chance you have to get out," Watts said.

2013: Who were the McStays?


Bodies found in McStay family mystery

The bodies
The call the family feared finally came in November 2013, from an off-roading motorcyclist in the Mojave Desert.

More than 150 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, and some 100 miles north of the McStay home, the biker found what looked to be part of a human skull in a remote area of Victorville, California.

Authorities investigated and found four skeletons in two shallow graves. With the help of dental records, they determined the bodies belonged to the McStays.

Once considered a missing persons case, the investigation moved to homicide. It also switched jurisdictions -- passing from the San Diego County Sheriff's Department to the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.

Jan Caldwell, with the San Diego department, defended her office's handling of the case.

"This is an incredibly thorough investigation," she said, her hand atop a thick stacks of files. "Thumbing through it, I can see phone records, I see photographs, I see communications.

"And to have done all of this -- to have compiled this kind of a massive file and still not know the answer -- enormously frustrating," Caldwell said last year, soon after the remains were discovered.

The San Diego County Sheriff's Department is no longer commenting on the case. It refers all questions to San Bernardino, which declines to get into specifics, citing the ongoing investigation.

Summer's mother, brother and sister also declined to comment to CNN.

As the pieces begin to come together, it's looking to me like it was extremely orchestrated. So we have to ask ourselves, why?
Investigative Journalist Steph Watts

The mystery
Detectives still have not named any suspects or persons of interest.

"There was certainly evidence found in and around the grave sites, but at this point we're not prepared to talk about what evidence we did locate," said McMahon, the San Bernardino sheriff.

Watts said the only way the case will be cracked now is if someone talks.

"There was more than one person involved in this case because not one person dragged four people out to the desert and buried them single-handedly," he said.

"As the pieces begin to come together, it's looking to me like it was extremely orchestrated. So we have to ask ourselves, why?"
Like Watts, Patrick McStay believes the killer, or killers, has to be someone who hated his family for a reason -- but that reason is unclear.

So many theories. So many questions. So few answers.

"It's like a play. The first act has just ended. We've got three more acts to go," he said.


http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/03/justice/mcstay-murder-mystery/

---

Desert deaths mystery: Five questions about the McStay case

From Randi Kaye, CNN
updated 4:32 PM EDT, Tue July 1, 2014

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• The bodies of the McStay family were found in the desert last year
  
• The family was last seen alive in February 2010
  
• Detectives have not named any suspects
  

Editor's note: For the latest on the McStay murders, watch "Buried Secrets: Who Murdered the McStay Family?" at 9 p.m. ET Tuesday on CNN.

(CNN) -- It's been more than four years since the McStay family went missing, and nearly eight months have passed since their remains were found in the Mojave Desert.

Who would want to kill Joseph; his wife, Summer; and their two young kids, Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr., 3? How did their bodies end up in two shallow graves some 100 miles north of their home?

Investigators still have not named any suspects or persons of interest, but those involved aren't giving up.

A new detective recently joined the investigation, bringing new energy and new ideas to the table.
As the investigation continues, here are five questions that could provide clues about the case:

 
Who killed the McStay family?


What happened to the McStay family?

1. Who used Joseph McStay's phone shortly after he disappeared?
On February 4, 2010, Chase Merritt received a phone call from Joseph McStay. It was 8:28 p.m.
Chase, Joseph's close friend, picked up the phone, looked at it, and set it back down.

"I had a bunch of other things I was doing, and I was just tired," he told CNN.

Joseph ran a custom water feature business, and he often bought custom indoor waterfalls from Chase. The two talked frequently. Chase had already talked to Joseph multiple times that day, and they had also met in person for a couple of hours.

"I had no idea that something like this was going to happen," said Chase.

Was that just a regular call from his friend, or could it have been a call for help?

"There are hundreds of scenarios. I have gone over all of them in my head," he added. "Of course I regret not picking up the phone."

What happened to the McStays?

2. Who used Summer McStay's credit card the day she disappeared?
According to phone records, Summer McStay made a call from her home phone at 2:11 p.m. February 4 regarding purchasing herbal medicine. Financial records show her credit card was used 25 minutes later at a store in Vista, California, about 20 minutes from her home.


Many questions remain in McStay case


Bodies found in McStay family mystery 

It's not clear whether Summer was the one who made that purchase.

"That is certainly a piece of evidence that we would review if there's any video or any documentation to support who was at that store and used that credit card," said John McMahon, sheriff of San Bernardino County.

"Every piece of evidence in this case is critical," he said.
2013: Who were the McStays?
3. Did Joseph McStay's business have anything to do with his families' disappearance?
In the months before his disappearance, business at Joseph's company was good.

So good, in fact, that Joseph was working on a deal that could have been worth $9 million, his father, Patrick McStay, said.

By summer of 2011, Dan Kavanaugh, who worked for Joseph managing his company's website, had sold the business to an outside company. Patrick was enraged.

"He owned nothing of --- any part of, any share of, anything," he said.

Dan, however, said he and Joseph split everything 50-50.

"We shared ownership from the beginning of starting the company," he said.

Although Patrick had his suspicions about Kavanaugh, Dan has maintained his alibi and innocence.
"I was in Hawaii for over a month before he disappeared," he said.

And the evidence CNN has uncovered seems to indicate Kavanaugh was in Hawaii around the initial days of the McStays' disappearance.

4. Why was someone using the McStays' computer to research traveling to Mexico?
One week before the McStays went missing, someone used their home computer to search for information on how to get children into Mexico.

Four days after they disappeared, detectives say the family's white Isuzu Trooper was parked and subsequently towed from a parking lot just steps from the Mexican border.

Investigators also found surveillance video showing a family of four matching the McStays' description crossing on foot into Mexico on February 8.

"I just thought, 'Well, maybe they took off,' " said Joseph's mother, Susan Blake. But his father wasn't buying it.

"I said right up front, the first time I saw it (the surveillance footage), it wasn't them," said Patrick, adding that Summer was afraid of Mexico.

"Would Summer take her two children in there? Heck, no," he said.

Still, investigators want to know whether the computer search and their disappearance were related.

5. Was crucial evidence in the McStay family home destroyed?
Eleven days after the McStays went missing, Joseph's brother Michael called the Sheriff's Department. He said he waited so long because he didn't want to overreact and thought the family might just be on vacation.

Brother to killers: 'You guys are cowards'
The Sheriff's Department immediately alerted homicide, but it took investigators four days to obtain the warrants needed to complete a full search of the home.

During those three days, the McStay home was unsealed. The McStays' friends and family had some access in and out of the house.

Joseph's mother straightened up the kitchen, which she says smelled terrible because of the trash.
Michael McStay said the house was not deemed a crime scene because there was no sign of forced entry.

With investigators' permission, he said, he grabbed his brother's computer and SD card.

Given all of the foot traffic in the house, freelance investigative journalist Steph Watts said critical evidence could have been lost.

"Certain items that might have been really key to the big mystery of why they left that house are gone," he said.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/01/justice/mcstay-case-five-questions/

Chase Merritt was arrested for the murder. Police say the family was killed in the home; father died of blunt force trauma but no COD listed yet for others. Also no motive as chase is now bankrupt but maybe He was caught embezzling as has been much of his history.

Can't give a link because I'm on iPad and I read the story on News360 - counting on Twinkletoes (or one of you dears) to come through for me.

Suspect arrested in the murders of California family who disappeared four years ago 

Charles (Chase) Merritt, a convicted felon, has been charged with four counts of murder. Joseph McStay and his wife, Summer, and their two young sons disappeared in 2010.

    
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Published: Friday, November 7, 2014, 12:48 PM
Updated: Friday, November 7, 2014, 2:23 PM

San Bernardino County Sheriff/APCharles (Chase) Merritt has been arrested and charged with murdering a California family who disappeared four years ago. He was a business associate of Joseph McStay, who was killed with his wife, Summer, and their two young boys.

A suspect has been arrested and charged with four counts of murder in the slaying of a California family who disappeared four years ago, authorities announced Friday.

Charles (Chase) Merritt, 57, a former business associate and friend of Joseph McStay, was arrested Wednesday and is being held without bail in San Bernardino County, Sheriff John McMahon said in a press conference. He declined to disclose a motive for the killings. He has been charged killing Joseph, his wife, Summer, and their two small sons, Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr., 3.

He acted alone, McMahon said. Blunt-force trauma was the cause of death and the killings happened in the family's Fallbrook home, he said.


Joseph McStay owned a fountain-making business, and authorities announed Friday that a business associate has been arrested and charged with his murder, as well as the murders of his wife and two small sons.
Joseph McStay, Jr. , seen here, was the youngest son of Josephy and Summer McStay. The entire California family disappeared four years ago in a highly publicized case. A suspect was arrested this week, authorities announced Friday. Summer McStay was killed with her family by a business associate of her husband’s, San Bernardino, Calif., authorities announced Friday. The arrest of Charles (Chase) Merritt ends a 4-year-old investigation into their disappearnce and killings. Gianni McStay, age 4, is seen here in a photo released by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. Four years after he was killed with his family, investigators announced Friday they have arrested a suspect. Handout Charles Chase Merritt, 57, has been arrested for murders of Joseph and Summer McStay and their two children, 4-year-old Gianni and 3-year-old Joseph Jr.


Merrit has at least two felony convictions and has served prison time, authorities said.

Michael McStay, Joseph's brother, choked back tears Friday as he thanked homicide investigators and Sheriff McMahon for sticking with the case and arresting a suspect. "They did a great job," he said. "You have no idea what this means," he said, weeping. "I just wanted to see it through. Joseph was a great brother and a great father."

James Quigg/APMichael McStay, center, and his wife, Erin, look over crosses erected in the California desert in honor of brother Joseph McStay and his family, whose remains were discovered there three years after the family disappeared.

Joseph owned a company that made water fountains and had offered work to Merritt, the brother said. "He tried to help Chase and this is what he got," McStay said.

Authorities said the suspect and Joseph McStay had business relations, and were friends, but did not elaborate.

Business Associate of Father Arrested in Connection to McStay Family's Deaths
California authorities this week arrested a suspect in the deaths of the McStay family a southern California family of four that vanished in 2010, San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon said Friday. The suspect, a business associate of Joseph McStay, was arrested Wednesday and charged with four counts of murder.This video aired on the KTLA 5 Morning News on Friday, Nov. 7, 2014.
KTLA - Los Angeles

The McStays disappeared from their San Diego County home in 2010, under deeply mysterious circumstances.

Police found eggs on the kitchen counter and bowls popcorn in the living room, along with the family's two dogs. There were no signs of struggle.

Last year, a motorcyclist in San Bernardino County found two shallow graves near Interstate 15, about 100 miles from the family's Fallbrook home. The family's remains were identified through dental records.

The McStay's SUV was discovered in the California border town of San Ysidro, where it had been towed from the Mexican side. Surveillance footage appeared to show a family crossing the border, but authorities have determined the family was not the McStays, McMahon said Friday.


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/suspect-arrested-calif-murders-mcstay-family-article-1.2002888

🐞 Thank you my dear! Knew you'd come through 😄

I'll never be able to wrap my head around how he could have killed the children.

McStay Murders: Inside the Shocking Arrest of a Family Friend



Charles Merritt is arrested for the McStay family murders
San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department
By Elaine Aradillas

11/13/2014 AT 07:30 AM EST

After Joseph McStay and his family went missing in February 2010, Joseph’s father, Patrick, wanted to speak to his friends – even if it meant possibly speaking to his son’s killer.

He had a list of people he thought could have harmed his son and his family. One of the names was Charles "Chase" Merritt, 57, a business associate who worked with Joseph and helped with his decorative water sculpture company.

"I didn't have proof and I didn't know it was definitely him," Patrick McStay tells PEOPLE. "I had direct contact with him, so I had to try and keep that contact open to see what I could find out."

Patrick's suspicions were validated on Nov. 5 when Merritt was arrested on four counts of murder. He was charged with murdering Joseph McStay, 40, his wife Summer, 43, and their sons Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr, 3.


The McStay family
McStay Family / ZUMA

Their bodies were found a year ago when a motorcyclist discovered a weathered skull while riding through the desert, nearly 100 miles away from the family's Fallbrook, California, home.

For many years following their 2010 disappearance, friends and family could only guess what would make the young family want to leave behind a successful business, as well as their beloved dogs.


Once their bodies were found, those same friends and family wondered who would want them dead.

"Joey was the best," says his father. "He was good. He was honest."


http://www.people.com/article/mcstay-murders-arrest-charles-merritt-family-friend