NORWALK — They kept hoping. For years, they kept hoping.
But deep down, some family members of Amanda Dean’s knew she was dead from the time she vanished in July 2017. When they reported her missing on July 11, they told Huron County Sheriff Todd Corbin they feared Fred Reer Jr. killed her.
They were right. But for nearly six years Corbin refused to start a murder investigation, falsely claiming Amanda was alive. All Corbin ever had to do was ask Reer’s brother, Paul.
Tracy Thom, an independent advocate for crime victims, told BCI in February 2023, before its investigator was even on the ground in Huron County, to go ask Paul Reer what happened to Amanda.
“Paulie will show you where (Fred) killed Amanda by pointing and motioning a slit over his throat,” Thom tells BCI Special Agent John Saraya in the Feb. 4, 2023 email, one of a series of more than two dozen emails Thom sent to Saraya telling hime where to find the evidence that would show Fred Reer Jr. Killed Amanda.
Nine months later, a BCI agent interviewed Paul Reer at the Wells Road property where Amanda was killed in 2017. Another state agent and Rin Reer, Fred and Paul’s mother, are with them during the interview. He struggles over the question for a few moments, seeming to be distraught by it. But, just as Thom told Saraya would happen, Paul Reer made the motion with his hand to his throat.
Thom started looking for proof Fred killed Amanda after responding to a Facebook messuage in October 2022 from Amanda’s son asking for help. She talked with neighbors, witnesses, and did enormous research online and began promoting an “Amanda Matters” awareness campaign. Less than three months later, the state launched a murder investigation and her story began attracting media attention in Cleveland and nationwide.
Reer admitted in December that he killed Amanda Dean. In a pre agreement, he was convicted on involuntary manslaughter, abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence. He was sentenced on Jan. 5 to 14 years in prison.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost is improperly withholding nearly all records related to the state’s investigation, and he won’t say if state agents determined who derailed the murder investigation for six years, or what the motivation was to derail it. StayTunedSandusky.com is reviewing legal remedies to force Yost to release the record.
Release the records. All of them.
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