Murder of Chelsea Bruck

Chelsea Ellen Bruck was born on January 28th, 1992 in Trenton, Michigan to Matthew and Leannda Bruck. She was the youngest of five kids. She had three older sisters, Jennifer, Megan, and Kassandra – and they were known as the “Bruck girls.” She also had an older brother, Nathaniel. She also had a niece named Anna. Chelsea attended St. Patrick Elementary School and Monroe High School.

At the time of her murder, Chelsea was 22-years-old and living at home with her parents in Maybee, Michigan. She had been working at a restaurant called Olga’s Kitchen as a hostess for four years.

Chelsea enjoyed watching movies, musicals in particular, listening to music with her favorite band being Queen, playing video games, especially Final Fantasy VIII, and watching her favorite show, Doctor Who. Chelsea also enjoyed baking and reading and had a special love for her dog and cats. She was described by her friend, Penny, in the Dateline episode, The Halloween Party, as a nice and wholesome person who wanted to meet new people.

Chelsea worked at Olga’s Kitchen with her friend, Becky Brinson, and the two were looking forward to the annual Halloween party at Big Mike’s all summer. The two friends both loved dressing up for Halloween and had attended Big Mike’s Halloween bash a couple times before. Big Mike threw large Halloween parties on his mother’s property in Southeast Michigan in Monroe County every year.

As the days inched closer to Halloween, Chelsea and Becky began planning out their costumes. They decided that they would go as Batman villains and Chelsea picked Poison Ivy. Chelsea made the costume herself, spending hours and hours hand-sewing fake leaves on a green leotard. She got herself green tights, a maroon wig with red ends, and she got a wine jug that she relabeled as poison to carry around with her the night of the party.

The party was held at Mike Williams aka Big Mike’s mother’s property, the weekend before Halloween on Saturday, October 25th, 2014. Big Mike had two large tents set up, there were eight heavy metal bands, one of which he was in, that would play throughout the night, and later there was a large bonfire. There were 600-800 people in attendance that night.

Chelsea and Becky went to the party and met up with Chelsea’s friend, Penny Watkins. The girls were having a good time and enjoying the party together. At around midnight, the bands stopped playing and the large bonfire was lit. As the girls made their way over to the bonfire, Chelsea ran into a tentpole and bumped her nose. According to Becky, Chelsea’s nose wasn’t bleeding, but there had been a mark left on the spot she had bumped. Becky and Penny were laughing about it because Chelsea was known to be fairly clumsy, but Chelsea was upset and wanted to go home. Her friends were able to calm her down, though, and Chelsea began enjoying the party again.

At around 1:00 on October 26th, all three girls decided it was time to head home. Earlier in the night, Chelsea had asked Penny if she would give her a ride home, and she agreed. However, by this time, Penny and Chelsea had lost sight of each other, and Penny needed to get her sister home because she had to work early that morning. Knowing that Chelsea had other friends at the party, Penny decided to head out with her sister. Becky, who was also getting ready to leave the party, couldn’t find Chelsea, either, and had no way of getting in touch with her. Becky had been holding onto Chelsea’s phone for her because the Poison Ivy costume had no pockets. Becky didn’t know if Chelsea had found a new ride and wasn’t sure what to do, and ultimately left with Chelsea’s phone.

The next day, Sunday, October 26th, Becky called Chelsea’s mom, Leannda, and left her a message letting her know that she had Chelsea’s phone, and that she would be home all day so she could come pick it up at any time. Meanwhile, Chelsea’s family was beginning to worry about where she was. She hadn’t returned home from the party and she hadn’t called any of them. After a while, they began calling around to some of Chelsea’s friends, and Big Mike, to see if anyone knew where she was. No one had, so they called the police.

That day, Big Mike had been getting phone calls and Facebook messages from several different people, including one of Chelsea’s sisters, asking him if he knew where Chelsea was and suggesting that he go search the fields on the property for her. At first, Mike wasn’t sure who everyone was talking about, but eventually put it together. He grabbed his dog and hiked through the property and looked through the fields. During his search, though, his dog came up on a fox trap and was injured, so he made his way back up to the house to take the dog to the vet. When he got there, though, Chelsea’s mom was there waiting for him. It was said to be a “chilly” greeting. But Big Mike left to take his dog to the vet.
When he returned home, there were people searching through the field and that’s when things really became alarming for him. Chelsea’s family and friends had set up camp on his property. They had a tent, a generator, and a port-a-potty. Chelsea’s family was very suspicious of him at the time and were definitely trying to put the heat on him. According to Big Mike, they had never asked permission to set up camp on his property.

While Chelsea’s friends and family were searching, so were the police, however, none of the searches turned up anything. By Monday evening, Chelsea’s mom was openly accusing Big Mike of having something to do with Chelsea’s disappearance. At this point, Chelsea’s friends and family were hoping that Chelsea was just lost in the woods, or had tripped and gotten stuck, and that they would find her on Big Mike’s property. The search continued on with people going door to door asking anyone in the area if they had seen Chelsea, or anything that would lead them to her.

The police had a huge investigation in front of them if Chelsea didn’t turn up. They had to investigate the 600-800 people that attended the party that night – most, if not all, of which were dressed up in Halloween costumes. While investigators began looking into the party and who had all been there, one of Chelsea’s sisters continued to lead search parties around Big Mike’s property.

Detectives Brian Stroka and Mike Preadmore led the investigation and knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. They told Keith Morrison on the Dateline episode that this was a worst case scenario to start an investigation. The party was in the middle of nowhere and the only light was from the bonfire and the moon that night, not to mention the hundreds of people dressed up for Halloween. Detectives Stroka and Preadmore spent a lot of time learning about Chelsea and said that she had become like a sister to them. They learned that Chelsea had told her mom that she had only planned to be at the party for a short time, and that she didn’t drive. They quickly determined that Chelsea wasn’t someone who would just up and leave her life.

The police learned that Chelsea didn’t have a boyfriend at the time, but she did have guys that she was interested in. They looked into them and determined that none of them had attended the party that night. Then they questioned if any of them had picked her up or maybe had someone else pick her up for them. All in question (and I don’t know how many and I’m not trying to make it sound like a lot, but it wasn’t explicitly stated), were brought in and talked to, their homes were searched, their cell phones were searched, and their clothes were collected for DNA and fiber testing.

Investigators also made contact with six different people who had let Chelsea use their phones at the party. Chelsea tried calling two of her friends that night, one of them being Penny. She had gotten in touch with Penny and asked her if she would come back to the party and pick her up, but Penny had said that she had had too much to drink and had no business driving. Penny told Dateline that Chelsea didn’t seem upset when she said she couldn’t go back for her. Detectives learned from witnesses at the party, though, that Chelsea had been seen crying by the fire saying that she had no friends to give her a ride, and that she was cold and upset. According to police, Chelsea never tried to call her mom for a ride.

A few days after the party and Chelsea’s disappearance, investigators received a call from a woman who said that her son had seen Chelsea at the party and had spoken to her about her Poison Ivy costume. Police spoke with the son who said that he had seen and spoken with Chelsea around 3:30 am and he said that she was tipsy. This witness said that he had seen Chelsea with a man who was hovering over her. He described him as being tall and slender, and having swooping hair. He was also wearing glasses. He described the person so well that the police were actually able to have a sketch artist draw a composite sketch that was immediately released to the public. After the release of the sketch, the police got a flood of phone calls. They hadn’t realized that that was a common look for young men at the time. Big Mike had said that a lot of people looked like that, including some members of a metal band from Milwaukee that had played at the party. With the theory that they could have had something to do with it, whether she left with them, or otherwise, the police asked the FBI to track them down. However, they all had alibis and were cleared.

Four days after the party, investigators spoke with Big Mike and he told them that he didn’t know Chelsea, but he did know who she was. They asked him if they could search his house, and he said no. This raised red flags for police. After this, the police obtained a warrant and went back to his property with thirteen SWAT officers to search his home and property. The house was searched, but turned nothing up. The property and the fire pit were searched, but nothing turned up there either. Despite this, Mike remained a person of interest in the case.

Then police received a tip about a man named Harlin Bird. The police brought him in and learned that he had been at the party with his best friend. Harlin told the police that he remembered seeing two men harassing a female in the parking lot. He said that they were shoving, pushing, and assaulting her, and she was crying and yelling for help. According to Harlin, he went to help Chelsea and got some of her blood on his shirt in the process. He was able to describe Chelsea and her costume to a T, including the wig. He then said that he put Chelsea in the backseat of a red, four-door car, of which he did not know the owner of. He said that he then went into the party to look for someone who knew Chelsea. He told police that he was gone for 5-15 minutes, which again I say, that’s a weird time frame. He said that when he came back, both the car and Chelsea were gone. Police asked him about the shirt that he was wearing that had the blood stain on it and he said he definitely still had it, but it was possible that his girlfriend/fiance (he doesn’t know??) had already washed it.

He asked the police if they could still test it if it had been washed, but they told him that they couldn’t. They also went back and forth about the blood because his story about her having a bloody nose wasn’t super clear. He said that he assumed that she had had a bloody nose because she had rested her face on his shoulder and blood got on his shirt. But he never actually saw blood on her face. Investigators really started putting pressure on Harlin at this point in the interview and asked him if he took her, if he raped her, if he killed her, but he continued to deny all of it. Finally, they asked Harlin if he had actually seen or had any contact with Chelsea that night and he said that no, he didn’t – he just wanted to look good. Harlin Bird was arrested and charged for lying to police. But he, too, remained on the police’s radar.

Chelsea had been missing for over a week when her family held a candlelight vigil and prayer service at St. Charles Catholic Church in Newport, Michigan. Leannda made an appeal to the public for anyone to come forward with any information they had stating, “Somebody knows something.” At this point, they moved their search headquarters from Big Mike’s property to a vacant bank in town. The searchers divided up into groups to search in specific neighborhoods and they put up missing persons posters with purple ribbons.

In the first week of January of 2015, the police received a tip and what they hoped would be a break in the case. A woman went into the police station and told investigators that her ex-boyfriend had confessed to killing Chelsea. The detectives brought Kerri Car into an interview room where she told them that she wanted her ex locked up. She said that he couldn’t be questioned and released, though, because if he was, he would come after her and her child.

After hearing this, investigators brought Kerri’s ex-boyfriend in for an interview. They told him everything that Kerri had told them, without mentioning her by name. He told the police that he and Kerri had been having problems for quite a long while at this point and he believed that she was doing this to get back at him and get him in trouble. With this, Kerri was brought back in for additional questioning. She admitted to telling this story to get him in trouble. Kerri was arrested for lying to the police and they were now back to square one in their investigation after losing several days chasing this lead.

The investigation continued over the next couple of months and then in late March of 2015, the police got a call from a woman who lived not too far from Big Mike’s. Sheryl Retzlaff was walking the perimeter of her property on a Sunday in late March, like she did every year as winter came to a close. She said that she always finds all manner of things when doing her annual walk in the spring. She’s found things like cameras hanging from trees, car radios, speakers, cases of booze, you name it. However, on this particular walk, Sheryl found a shoe – it was leather, flat, and red, and was similar to a Mary Jane style shoe. She threw it in her trash bag and moved on. When her husband came home and asked what she found this time, she told him about the shoe and he was instantly on alert. He immediately thought of missing Chelsea Bruck and thought it was possible that the shoe was hers.

Sheryl called the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. They photographed the shoe and sent it over to Leannda, Chelsea’s mom, to see if it was Chelsea’s. Leannda as well as several other family members were able to confirm that it was Chelsea’s shoe. This was tip #623 and finally gave them a big break in the case, however, Chelsea was still missing. They searched several miles around the area where the shoe was found, but they found nothing else.

Chelsea had been missing for five months and the only thing the investigation had turned up was one of her shoes. But then, the police got a call from a man named Eric Kassab. Eric and a friend of his were searching for scrap metal to sell for cash and stumbled upon an abandoned building. They went inside to look around and they saw something that looked like a fake plant. They also saw a red wig and initially decided they didn’t want to pick it up because it looked creepy. When Eric’s friend told him that it was a Poison Ivy costume, they picked it up and debated on keeping it, but ultimately decided it wasn’t worth their time.

About a week later, Eric was at work when he saw a poster of a missing girl wearing a costume that looked much like the one he saw in the abandoned building. Eric was unsure if he should report it initially because he felt like it would look suspicious since he had touched it. He knew what DNA was due to watching TV shows and ultimately decided not to call or turn in the costume. However, the costume stayed in the back of his mind and he told his sister about it at Easter. She told him that he had no choice and if he didn’t call the police, she would.

So, Eric made the call that Easter and investigators made their way out to the abandoned building. When they arrived, they had a feeling it was Chelsea’s costume. The costume was ripped in two places and was sent to the state lab for testing. Detectives searched the area for any additional clues and Eric Kassab was brought into the station for questioning. When being interviewed, Eric said that he had not gone to the party at Big Mike’s on Halloween weekend and that he was home with his daughter. They also learned that his daughter’s mom lived on the same road that Chelsea’s shoe was found on. There wasn’t anything more they could do in regard to Eric at the time, but he remained suspicious to the investigators.

Then, police realized that Harlin Bird, who had lied to police earlier in the investigation, lived just about 200 yards from the abandoned building. So, they called Harlin back into the station for another interview. When asked, Harlin had no explanation as to how Chelsea’s costume was found so close to his home, but he did admit to having gone into that building before. He also told investigators that he believed that somebody was trying to frame him. Harlin agreed to take a polygraph test, which he passed, and he also submitted DNA.

While waiting for the results of the DNA tests, police continued investigating and looking for Chelsea. Then on April 24th, 2015, police received a call that a body had been found. Just about seven miles from Big Mike’s property, a dump truck pulled up to a construction site. The land had been purchased and the owner was building his dream home on it. The driver of the dump truck was backing up to the site and ended up getting stuck in some mud. He exited the vehicle to take a look and see what happened. When he got to the back of the truck, he saw the body and called the property owner, who then called 911. When the property owner spoke with dispatch, he said that he was sure it was the girl from the missing posters, but her face was unrecognizable at the time.

Monroe County Police called in the Michigan State Police crime lab to take a close look at the body that had been covered in small logs and branches. Police found an artificial leaf just like the ones Chelsea’s costume was made out of not too far from where her body had been found. This wasn’t absolute confirmation that it was Chelsea Bruck, but it was pretty clear to investigators that this was likely her.

The police went to Chelsea’s family right away to tell them that a body had been found so that they wouldn’t hear it from the media first. They told the Bruck family that it wasn’t clear that it was Chelsea, but that there was a good possibility that it was. Dental records were used to identify the body and it was then confirmed that it was Chelsea Bruck. More pressure was now on the police to solve the case because it was now a homicide and they needed to catch the killer before they struck again.

Shortly after Chelsea’s body was found, the DNA results from Chelsea’s costume came in. They learned that Chelsea’s DNA and blood was on the leotard as well as the DNA of an unknown man. Investigators entered the DNA into CODIS (Combined DNA Index System) and received no hits. The crime lab assured them that the sample was good and that it was just a matter of time before there was a match. With this sample, both Eric Kassab and Harlin Bird were officially cleared.

Now that there was DNA, the police began collecting samples from anyone and everyone that they could. They went back to several people that they originally spoke with who had attended the party and many gave their DNA. Big Mike, though, refused. He said that his attorney had told him that he didn’t have to provide a DNA sample if he didn’t want to. He said that he didn’t want his DNA in the database because he wasn’t a criminal or a felon. The police still considered him a person of interest at this point.

A month after Chelsea’s body was found, the medical examiner’s office released the autopsy report. Chelsea had died from blunt force trauma to the head. There were multiple fractures identified on her orbital bones, jawbone, and teeth.

Then in early September of 2015, about ten months after Chelsea went missing, the man who had found her body called the sheriff’s office once again. He was working on the property and found a red shoe. Investigators made their way back out to the property and determined that it was the matching left shoe that Sheryl Retzlaff had found on her property. They searched the property once again and in this search, they found the green tights Chelsea had been wearing with her costume.

Still tracking down people from the party, the police circled back on a tip that they had received early on in the investigation that wasn’t considered to be anything big at the time. There had been a white male with a mustache that went to a man’s property around 3:00 am the morning after Big Mike’s party asking for a place to stay. The homeowner said hell nah, you can’t stay here, but he decided to sleep on his front porch anyway. When he had finally decided to head home, the man left his vest on the porch. The homeowner called the police because he had found a knife and some rope in the pockets of the vest. Then the dude returned and took his vest. So, now that they had DNA, they decided to watch footage of the party and spotted a guy matching the description wearing a black vest. Investigators put a photo of him out to the media and he ended up coming forward on his own to speak with police. He told the detectives that he was pretty drunk that night and didn’t remember much. The police took his DNA and scheduled a polygraph exam. But, on the day the polygraph was scheduled, the police received a call from the evidence technician saying that he had received an email and there was something that they needed to see right away. The lab sheet had confirmation of DNA that matched but it wasn’t anyone who they had previously looked at. Black vest guy and Big Mike were officially cleared and they knew who had killed Chelsea.

The DNA matched to a man named Daniel Clay who lived in Monroe County. The investigators on Chelsea’s case didn’t know him, but they quickly learned that he didn’t have a permanent address and would live house to house and have different girlfriends all the time. He also had a few kids. He was also unemployed.

As investigators continued digging into his past, they learned that Clay had been arrested by the Monroe County Police in May of 2016 for stealing a backpack that contained about $700 worth of tattooing equipment, and it was a felony. And because of a recent change in the law in Michigan, his DNA was entered into CODIS because he was arrested on a felony charge. Before this, DNA was only entered if one was convicted of a felony.

Despite having his DNA, locating him proved to be fairly difficult because, as we said, he didn’t have a permanent address. At the time, Clay also had two warrants out for unpaid child support, so once he was located, they set up surveillance and made a plan for his arrest. They were going to arrest him for his warrants, but not tell him that he was a murder suspect. At least not right away.

Once Clay was located, the police surrounded the trailer. They went to the door, but he wouldn’t come out. He then fled out the back door, but luckily, there were several officers back there as well. He was booked and taken to jail. Once in the interview room, he was asked about Chelsea, and he denied knowing her, seeing her, or even hearing of her. But he did see it on the news, though. He said that he only knew who Chelsea was because of the news. He told the detectives that he knew a lot of women, though, and that he was a lover and a real ladies man. Sure, dude. He said that he had two children with two different women with another on the way, and was living a nice and simple life. He said, “I live like it should be the ‘70s. Like, free love. Peace and love. That’s my motto. Like, I don’t like fighting, really. I don’t like violence. I don’t like… I just like smoking weed and having sex.”

Then detectives cut to the chase and asked him if there was any reason that his DNA would be with Chelsea. He said there was no reason it would be on her clothes or in her hair, at least not to his knowledge. Detectives and Clay went back and forth on if he knew her, they continued to ask, and he continued to deny. But finally, Clay said that there was a possibility, because he did have sex with someone that night out in his car. After having sex, he called his “baby mama,” and left. When pressed, he finally admitted that it was Chelsea he had sex with, but said that she was fine and breathing when he left her. He stated that she got out of his car and walked away. Police hadn’t revealed what type of DNA had been found, so Clay assumed it had been semen. When investigators told him that it was actually skin cells that had been found and that only his were there, he continued denying anything more than consensual sex had happened. He said, “I had sex with a girl. That’s it.”

At this point, the police decided it was time to lie to Clay. They told Clay that this was something only Chelsea’s mom and the police knew. They said that Chelsea had brittle bone disease, and when he heard this, he was like yeah, I have that, too, it’s why I break my fingers a lot. Then Clay asked for a cigarette and told the detectives a brand new story! Now he says that he had seen Chelsea walking down the road after the party and offered her a ride. He said that they had sex and things started to get freaky. According to Clay, Chelsea asked him to choke her, and he did. Then they switched positions and she was underneath him, and then she just stopped and went limp. He said that he tried tapping her face, but he guessed that he “choked her too hard or something.”

Clay said that he attempted CPR and kind of hit her on the chest a little bit. But then he freaked out, dragged her body, and put her in the back of his car and didn’t know what to do. He simply did not think of taking her to the hospital and just drove around. He drove until he saw railroad tracks where he decided to hide her with leaves and branches. He had absolutely no explanation as to how her costume ended up in an abandoned building 5 ½ miles away.

Daniel Clay was arrested and charged with the murder of Chelsea Bruck on July 22nd, 2016. Upon his arrest, he called his girlfriend, Jessica, who also worked at Olga’s Kitchen with Chelsea and Becky. Jessica was the one who broke the news to Becky that her boyfriend had killed Chelsea.

Daniel Clay confessed to an accidental killing, not murder, and pleaded not guilty to the first degree murder charge. The trial took place in May of 2017. The prosecution had to prove that Daniel Clay murdered Chelsea despite having no eyewitnesses and no proof. The prosecution’s stance was that Daniel Clay demanded something from Chelsea and she said no, so he used massive force to get what he wanted and killed her in the process. They believed it was possible that she accepted the ride from him and maybe knew him, but believed that he forced himself on her.

When the ME took the stand, she stated that because of the state of decomposition that Chelsea’s body was in when it was found, she didn’t have anything to evaluate on whether or not she had been asphyxiated. She said, though, that it is not a ten, twenty, or even thirty second process, so it certainly was not done by accident. According to the ME, with constant pressure placed on the neck, a person will lose consciousness within 20-30 seconds, and after that point, the constant pressure would need to be maintained on the neck of an unconscious person for an additional 2-2 ½ minutes before a victim would die.

Clay had told investigators that Chelsea had removed her clothes willingly, but according to the prosecution that wasn’t possible. They presented the green leotard to the jury and stated that Chelsea would have had to be wearing the costume when she was beaten for it to have that much blood on it. And with the rips on the strap and in the crotch area, the costume had to have been forcibly removed.

Clay’s defense team said that he did kill Chelsea, but it was no murder. They argued that it was a horrible accident caused by choking during consensual sex. The defense called their own forensic pathologist who testified that Chelsea was not beaten to death.

Daniel Clay took the stand in his own defense. He said that he was extremely emotional about what had happened and that he had never dealt with anything like that before. He said that maybe Chelsea hit her head on the car door and that he did drop her maybe five or six times. Or maybe the logs he placed on top of her caused the wounds to her head. It was an accident. He stated that he didn’t mean for her to die and when asked why he didn’t report it because he had been drunk and high and didn’t know where her body was.

The jury deliberated for less than a day before coming back with a verdict. Daniel Clay was found not guilty of first degree murder, but guilty of felony murder – murder during the commission of a crime. In this case, sexual assault. He was also found guilty of concealing the death of an individual.

Clay’s sentencing hearing took place two months later. Many people wore purple in honor of Chelsea. Leannda, Chelsea’s mom, spoke directly to Clay during her victim impact statement. She said, “Today with the strength from Jesus Christ, I forgive Daniel Clay, because if I don’t, all that has happened the last 2 and ¾ years will destroy the rest of my life. But forgiving is not forgetting. Because forgetting would mean that Chelsea didn’t matter, that Chelsea was not important, that Chelsea didn’t exist. Mr. Clay, I am leaving you with a Bible. Jesus came to heal our mess of a life, and I hope you will let him in to heal your mess.”

Daniel Clay told the court that he would keep the Bible as long as he could and that he was sorry for what he had done and what he put Leannda through. When it was time for sentencing, the judge said to Clay, “What’s very clear to me, Mr. Clay, you’re a liar, a rapist, and a killer. It is the sentence of this court that you be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.” His sentence for the concealment charge was 40-60 months.

Chelsea wasn’t Clay’s only victim, either. Shortly before his arrest for Chelsea’s rape and murder, he assaulted another young woman. In June of 2017, he was tried and convicted for that as well.