WASHINGTON — At the place where Poor Farm Road meets Route 110, about five miles south of Washington Village, a simple wooden cross stands beside the road sign where Michele Demar’s body was found on the morning of Aug. 3.
The cross, placed by her family, is adorned with photos of Demar as a child and as a young woman. It bears her name and a simple heart at the intersection of the wooden pieces.
The 33-year-old woman’s death received little attention at the time, as outward appearances suggested her death was by suicide. A press release issued by the Vermont State Police said an autopsy confirmed that Demar’s death was due to hanging but added, “the manner of death remains pending.” As of this month, her death certificate still said the same.
“Initial evidence gathered at the scene indicated the death is not suspicious, but this remains an active and open case,” state police said in mid-August, encouraging anyone with information to call the agency or leave an anonymous tip.
But Demar’s death has received more attention, and more scrutiny, since Oct. 25, when hunters came across the body of a second woman, 23-year-old Tanairy “Tanya” Velazquez Estrada, at the northern end of Poor Farm Road. The remoteness of the location was not lost on area residents, who were still questioning the circumstances of Demar’s death about three miles away and not even three months earlier.
“People come up here to dump tires and trash, not bodies,” said Bob Sherman, a retired Montpelier lobbyist and 40-year Washington resident. Velazquez Estrada’s body was found about 20 feet from the gate to his property, Sherman said, in or near an old cellar hole at a spot where the rural road turns particularly rugged.
“Clearly, the person who dumped the body didn’t have four-wheel-drive,” he said. Noting that the remote road has long attracted illicit activities, he added, “I believe they knew exactly where they were going when they left that body there.”
Velazquez Estrada, who state police said had lived “most recently” in Barre, had been reported missing by her mother on the same day the hunters found her body, police said. Her mother told police in Fitchburg, Massachusetts that she had not heard from her daughter in more than a week.
The cause of Velazquez Estrada’s death remains pending, as toxicology tests are expected to take from “several weeks to several months,” state police said.
On Thursday, Maj. Dan Trudeau, who heads the state police Major Crime Unit, confirmed that police “were treating it as a homicide,” but offered few other details, citing the importance of protecting the investigation.
In the days following the discovery of Velazquez Estrada’s body, grisly details about her death spread among community members in the small central Vermont town, which claims just more than 1,000 residents, while high school students took to social media to share what they had heard.
Rumor and speculation have filled the void left by the lack of information offered by state police, whose resources have been stretched thin by a string of eight apparent homicide cases in the month of October alone.
While it is not unusual for police to hold back details of a case that is under active investigation, Sherman and others said the silence does little to squelch the rumors or offer residents some needed context.
With the deaths being the topic of conversations at local gathering spots, including the Washington Village Store and the post office, Sherman said of Demar’s death, “I haven’t talked to anyone in town who believes it was a suicide.”
“Two deaths on a rural road, it makes no sense,” Sherman said, adding that the deaths have prompted “a plethora of emotions.”
“Some people are scared, some are confused, some are angry,” he said. “I think they should be releasing more information to the community.”
Trudeau, however, said nothing more could be offered at this point.
“I’m well aware that with any death investigation, there are often rumors among people in the communities,” he said. “In these cases, I cannot provide any more details to the public because it would jeopardize the investigation.”
Trudeau also declined to say whether there are any known connections between the two women or their deaths.
“The investigations into both of the deaths have been complicated by the fact it has been difficult to track down and interview associates,” he said. “But that is common in a lot of investigations.”
As he spoke, he chose his words carefully, clearly struggling with the limitations of what he could offer and urging patience.
“I feel like we’re making progress on the majority of the cases that we have pending right now,” he said. “Unfortunately, cases sometimes take a long time. They are not solved in the first week or so, and it is frustrating to us as well.”
What are the chances?
Henry Demar, Michele’s father, is among those looking for answers.
“Police aren’t telling me anything. It’s been very limited. I’ve actually had to contact them and they are all short-staffed,” Demar said this week.
Demar said his last contact with police was when he reached out to the detective heading up his daughter’s case and learned that there were polygraph tests being conducted. He estimates that was about five weeks ago.
There’s been no further communication since Velazquez Estrada’s body was found, he said.
“I know police had issued a statement saying (Velazquez Estrada’s) death was not connected to any of the other ones where foul play was happening, but they didn’t mention whether it had anything to do with our daughter’s death,” said Demar, a Northfield resident who, with his wife, also named Michele, have custody of their daughter’s two children.
Demar is forthright in acknowledging that his daughter led a troubled life, stemming from a decade-long struggle with substance use disorder. She found it difficult to stay off drugs after she was recently released from jail, despite a period of sobriety when she appeared to be pulling her life back together, he said.
Demar has his own theories on how and why his daughter may have died, mostly related to her being caught up in the drug culture that he believes left her vulnerable. While his daughter had previously used heroin, he said, she had more recently turned to crack cocaine.
Demar also believes there are inconsistencies in the stories of the last people to have seen his daughter alive, and he isn’t accepting that his daughter took her own life on that August morning, an explanation he said state police offered soon after her body was found.
“They specifically told me it looked like suicide and I said ‘no way.’ My daughter has certainly been in the dumps before, but she had two kids she loved and she and her sister were very close,” he said. “Michele would have left a note, and she wouldn’t have just drove out there and said, ‘that’s it.’”
“Something’s not right. She could have been drugged out. I just really don’t think my daughter would have done this to herself,” he said, adding that he has heard the speculation and rumors related to his daughter’s death. In one instance, a photo of her deceased body was photoshopped in a manner that only fueled the rumors, he said.
In light of the second woman’s death, Demar said the notion of his daughter dying by suicide seems even harder to believe.
“Something’s going on there, two on Poor Farm Road,” he said. “What are the chances?”
Little has been publicly released about the circumstances of Velazquez Estrada’s death, although those with knowledge of the case have said the injuries to her body were extensive and vicious. Efforts to reach her family members were unsuccessful. Fitchburg police, who took the missing persons report from her mother, declined to release the report, citing the ongoing police investigation in Vermont.
At the Goodrich Academy in Fitchburg, Principal Alexis Curry confirmed that Velazquez Estrada was a 2020 graduate of the alternative high school, which is part of the public school system. Curry said she had not been aware of Velazquez Estrada’s death.
“She was a very kind young lady. Staff were very fond of her,” Curry said. Noting that Velazquez Estrada had “overcome a lot of challenges in her life,” she added, “She just wanted to graduate and do bigger things.”
A 2019 photo from the Fitchburg Public School website shows a photo of Velazquez Estrada working with elementary school students as part of a community service learning program.
Community candlelight vigil planned
Diane Kinney is co-director of Circle, one of three agencies working in central Vermont to support people affected by domestic and sexual violence. She said the two deaths, combined with reports by women who said they have recently encountered suspicious behavior on rural backroads, has only heightened anxiety levels, as evidenced by an uptick in calls to her agency in October.
“Callers just say they are more afraid than usual; they aren’t going out at night. They are worried that there is someone out there hurting people,” she said.
Since the three agencies — Circle, Safeline and Mosaic — work with survivors of violence, Kinney said efforts to develop safety protocols have been made harder by all that is unknown about the deaths and reports of suspicious vehicles in the area.
“We’re all pretty frustrated, honestly,” Kinney said. “We work with a population that is very traumatized. Therefore, they are hypervigilant and want answers, just like the general public. We are finding ourselves not able to support them.”
Vermont State Police have said they responded to the reports of suspicious vehicles with “high-visibility patrols” in the region that includes Corinth and Topsham, but were unable to substantiate that any criminal behavior had taken place.
“The state police is aware of community concerns regarding these reports, and investigators also acknowledge that individuals may have varying perceptions regarding interactions with strangers,” state police said in a Nov. 1 press release.
While state police have said last month’s eight apparent homicides across the state appear to be “isolated incidents,” Kinney said police could do more to elaborate on the reasons why residents should not feel in danger.
“What else can they tell us? I don’t know,” she said. But given the number of recent homicides, she said, “it just doesn’t seem to add up.”
The sense of increased violence in the area, she said, prompted the three agencies to organize a candlelight vigil, scheduled for 4 p.m. Sunday in the town’s Carpenter Park. A flier for the event hangs in the village store, prominent near the exit door. It promotes the vigil as “a gathering for healing from the violence and trauma.”
“We decided to come together and invite folks to find a place of support and hopefully, in the community, find a little bit of hope,” Kinney said. “We don’t have the answers either, but we can support people in figuring out what things they can control.”
