Quemado woman accused of fatally shooting husband
Evidence revealed in cold case investigation

By Tom Purdom
Staff Writer

GRANTS — A cold case File arrest Wednesday in a 1998 Catron County murder has a Grants connection.

New Mexico State Police criminal investigators arrested an emotionless Phyllis Carroll, 56, of Quemado, about 7:20 a.m. Wednesday, for the alleged murder of her husband Jim Carroll.

She was arrested without incident by State Police at her residence on the Carroll Ranch, located seven miles north of Quemado. The 800-acre ranch is about eight miles from Cibola County.

"We went to her house and her friend came to the door," said Agent Michael Applegate, state police criminal investigation section. "We asked where she was and the friend said (she was) in the back bedroom. We went back there and I told her she was under arrest for murder. She showed no emotion what-so-ever."

Carroll was taken into custody and booked on charges of murder and tampering with evidence. She was booked into the Catron County Detention Center under a $500,000 cash or surety bond on Wednesday. Detention Center officials on Thursday said Carroll had not bonded out of jail as of 1 p.m.

Carroll's husband, Jim, was found dead, face-down in the dirt, in a corral at his ranch back in 1998. He had been shot once through his heart with a .38-caliber slug. Subsequent investigations show the Carroll's had two .38 caliber handguns. One was found, the other was never found. His estranged wife, Phyllis, then 49-years-old, was a suspect, but investigators could not put together enough evidence needed to make an arrest, until now.

State Police spokesman Jimmy Glascock said the arrest was the result of a persistent investigation conduct by State Police investigators recently designated to investigate cold case homicides.

Grants connection
The Grants connection stems from a trip Phyllis reportedly made to Grants visiting friends around the time Jim was shot to death. The Grants trip was her alibi she was not at the Carrol Ranch when her husband was shot.

Applegate assisted in the original investigation in 1998. He went though the ranks, was promoted and was assigned the case in 2004 as a cold case file. By mere chance, Applegate overheard another agent talk about a forensic seminar he had attended, and the case was broken wide open with the help of a forensic laboratory in Columbia, South Carolina.

Applegate said Jim's body was found about 9 p.m. Oct. 21, 1998, by Phyllis after she returned from Grants. She said she had been in Grants for the previous two days recovering from an illness, Applegate said.

Albuquerque Pathologist Dr. Jerri McLemore, said it appeared Jim had been dead for at least 24 hours before he was found. That would put his death sometime on Oct. 20th, 1998.

At first it was thought Jim had died from a heart attack. It was not a bloody crime scene. The bullet hit his heart, passed through it and lodged in his spine. It killed him instantly and left no blood exiting from the body. Catron County Deputy Medical Examiner Jess Carey tagged and bagged the body and sent it off to Albuquerque for an autopsy, apparently not knowing Jim had been shot. "The autopsy revealed James died as the result of a single gunshot wound to the chest," Applegate said.

From tragedy to murder
Suddenly, the tragedy went from a natural death to murder, and the state police were called into the case to investigate.

Agent Kirt Heider was the original state police investigator. Applegate, a uniformed patrol officer based in Quemado at the time, assisted in the investigation.

Applegate said in an arrest warrant affidavit, he knew the couple and was familiar with their relationship, their lifestyles and how they interacted with one another. "During the course of this investigation it has been established by witness interviews and personal knowledge that Phyllis Carroll and James E. Carroll had a dysfunctional relationship," Applegate said. He added that Phyllis had a drinking problem, one which Jim had trouble dealing with at the time. Applegate also said a few years before the murder, Phyllis attacked Jim with a knife, slicing him in the process.

Applegate said Jim had personal relationships with several female "friends" and would often have them visit them at his home. Applegate also said the relationships upset Phyllis greatly and she repeatedly vented her emotions with her friends about it.

Apparently life at the Carroll Ranch went from bad to worse, and in 1997 Jim moved into a mobile home he parked about a quarter of a mile from the main house.

Days after the murder, Phyllis told investigators she left her home at daybreak on Oct. 19, 1998, to visit Oma and Earl Arp in Grants. "Phyllis stated she was at the Arp residence until Wednesday afternoon, Oct. 21, 1998, and arrived home at 3 p.m. or 3:30 p.m.," Applegate said, adding she told investigators she noticed the water was off at her home, so she called his trailer and left a message. She said she later walked to his trailer and left a note on the door, then walked back to the main house where she took a nap until 9 p.m., Applegate said.

Inconsistencies
Several things did not add up. For instance, Applegate said Phyllis had to walk past her husband's pickup truck parked at the corral several times that day, but not once did she go to the corral until around 9 p.m. Also, when she found the body she called a friend, not 911, not an ambulance service, not the sheriff's department, just the friend.

Phyllis also told investigators she called Jim's telephone in the trailer on Oct. 20, 1998, saying she was in Grants having some doors fixed. A call from Grants to the ranch would have been long distance, but phone company records show no long distance telephone calls were made to Jim's telephone on Oct. 20, only local calls. "This information indicates that Phyllis' call was placed locally," Applegate said.

The question looms, if Phyllis' call was placed locally from the Quemado exchange, was she in the vacinity of the Carroll Ranch on Oct. 20, and not in Grants?

On Oct. 23, 1998, state police investigators came to Grants to interview Oma and Earl Arp, the friends Phyllis stayed with in Cibola County. Applegate said Oma Arp told investigators that Phyllis had left a red and white sweater at their home and they asked if the police wanted it. Applegate said the officers questioning the Arps said they did want the sweater. Agent Kirt Heider took the sweater into evidence.

The years ticked away and no arrests were made. The case eventually was handed from one agent to another.

Then, during an Aug. 23, 2002, interview, Phyllis asked a question which sent a red flag up the alarm pole. Phyllis casually inquired if she could have the red and white sweater back, that it was her favorite sweater, Applegate said.

It peaked Applegate's curiosity but he was not the agent in charge of the case. In August 2004, Applegate became the agent in charge. "I knew we needed to get the sweater checked,"Applegate said. The problem was, New Mexico did not have a crime lab with the kind of equipment needed to run the tests Applegate wanted.

South Carolina connection
In 2004, one of Applegate's fellow-agents attended a Tennessee forensic seminar, where the agent met Jennifer M. Stoner, senior agent of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Trace Evidence Department. Applegate said a subsequent telephone conversation with Stoner resulted in her telling him to send the sweater to her, that she could test it.

Sept. 1, 2004, Applegate sent the package to Stoner.

Sept. 14, Applegate opened his mail and there was the lab report back from Stoner. "The laboratory report indicates round lead particles, a component of gunshot residue, were collected from the right and left sleeves of Phyllis Carroll's red and white sweater," Applegate said. On Oct. 20, 2004, Stoner sent Applegate a second report, this one done from tests on Jim's shirt. It too, had round lead particles, a component of gunshot residue on it.

On Jan. 21, Magistrate Judge James F. Blackmer signed a warrant for Phyllis' arrest. It had been six years and three months since Jim had been shot to death.

On Wednesday, arrest warrant in hand, Applegate drove to the remote Carroll Ranch, and at 7:20 a.m., he knocked on the last door in the case.