Jodi Sanderholm was awake in her bed and petting the family cat the last time her mother saw her alive the morning of Jan. 5, 2007, Cindy Sanderholm testified Wednesday morning.
Her testimony came near the end of the morning session of Day 3 in the murder trial of Justin Thurber. He is accused of the kidnapping, rape, and murder of Jodi Sanderholm.
Cindy Sanderholm had left her job as secretary at the family’s glass shop because a contact lens had been bothering her. It was around 8:30 a.m. when she briefly visited with Jodi a final time face to face.
"She said, ?what are you doing home,’" a tearful Cindy Sanderholm said.
By 4 p.m. that same day, Cindy started worrying as she tried to reach Jodi on her cell phone. The mother of three went home from work early when her youngest daughter’s friends said they hadn’t heard from her either.
"I was just a nervous wreck," Cindy Sanderholm told the court.
She arrived home to find no sign that Jodi had been to the house, even though Jodi had called around noon to say she was heading to the house to clean up.
"There were no dirty clothes, the shower wasn’t wet," Cindy Sanderholm said.
Just after 6 p.m., Cindy and her husband Brian knew it was time to call the police. During his time on the stand ? just before Cindy testified ? he remembers police arriving.
"Things just started going crazy after that," he said.
AFTERNOON SESSION
Thurber’s parents and sister took the witness stand in the afternoon to discuss how they were unable to reach Thurber the afternoon investigators believe he killed Jodi Sanderholm. He finally called them about 6 p.m.
"He said he was out east of town on (U.S.) 166…..and wanted to know if somebody would pick him up," Glenda Thurber said.
Thurber had moved in with his family about a week before Sanderholm was kidnapped, raped and murdered on Jan. 5, 2007. A popular Cowley College student, Sanderholm disappeared after a dance team rehearsal that morning.
His sister, Alissa Thurber, said she lived with her parents and worked at a restaurant in Winfield in January 2007. She testified she tried unsuccessfully to call and text her brother that afternoon. He was home when she got there that evening and she learned that her father, Kevin Thurber, had given Justin Thurber a ride home.
He said he had been with friends and they had gotten stuck. The friends couldn’t get cell phone reception. They walked one direction while Justin Thurber said he headed back toward Ark City.
Kevin Thurber said it was raining and that he found his son west of the lake. Justin Thurber was wearing a black leather jacket he received for Christmas. He said he had been standing in the rain and was cold. He asked his dad to turn up the heater.
"He was just glad I finally found him," Kevin Thurber said. He didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. They went directly home. Justin Thurber took a shower before leaving. Kevin Thurber remembered that his son asked where a shirt was "because we just moved all his stuff back and hadn’t really organized it."
The Sanderholms had grown increasingly concerned when their daughter didn’t come home or call that afternoon. The family usually had dinner out on Friday nights. They called police about 6 p.m. A number of police officers took the stand during the afternoon to describe their roles in the hours that followed as they tried to find Sanderholm’s car.
They learned Thurber had been hanging around the college parking lot that morning. They were unable to locate either car.
While the search was going on in town, Charles Owen was headed home on U.S. 166. He testified he saw a black car turn into the fishing lake around 5:55 p.m. It was dark and misting rain. Owen said he didn’t think anything about seeing the car until a few days laterr when he saw the car on the news after it had been removed from the lake.
Sarah Smith also testified she was driving from Ark City to Sedan the day Sanderholm disappeared and she saw a man in a dark jacket walking along U.S. 166. sometime between 6:45 and 7 p.m.
Several women who worked at Subway in Arkansas City also testified briefly. Thurber was fired from there in late December 2006 because the other employees didn’t want to work with him. A surveilance video from the store shows Thurber picking up his pay checkabout 7:30 p.m. the day Sanderholm disappeared.
There has been no testimony at this point in the trial about where Thurber’s car might have been left if he did force Sanderholm to go with him in her car.
The defense attorneys have asked few questions of the prosecution witnesses so far. District Judge Jim Pringle dismissed court about 3:45 p.m. Testimony is expected to resume at 9 a.m. Thursday.
