The Murder of Dylan Redwine

Who Was Dylan?

Dylan Nicholas Redwine was born on February 6th, 1999 in Denver Colorado to Elaine Hatfield and Mark Redwine. Elaine and Mark were married for 18 years before divorcing. In addition to Dylan, Mark and Elaine had an older son, Cory. Despite Dylan and Cory being seven years apart, the two were very close. Cory often drove his brother to and from school and sports practice. In 2009, Elaine met Mike Hall, who was quick to become a father figure to the boys in their father’s absence.

Dylan was described by those who knew him as a funny and bright boy. He loved to play practical jokes, Xbox, and being outdoors. He was said to have a great arm that could throw a perfect spiral football and throw a baseball from the outfield to the bases with no problem. He was a fast runner and loved playing basketball. Some described his basketball moves as being like the Globetrotters! His favorite baseball team was the Boston Red Sox, which he initially picked because they were his favorite colors. He always challenged his big brother to bets about different sporting events, with the loser having to do the other’s chores! 

While Dylan was a goofball and could make everyone laugh, he hated having his picture taken. Friends said he had a very high-pitched giggle that, when it started, everyone else around started laughing too. His mother said that he was empathetic and always worried about others’ feelings. He hated hearing people say bad things about his friends or family, and would immediately defend them. After the divorce, Elaine moved herself and the two boys out of Durango Colorado and over 300 miles away to Colorado Springs. Dylan loved living there and made friends easily. Some described him as being “scrubbed in sunshine”. There was no question that Dylan was full of energy, happiness, and love. 

The Disappearance

On September 21st, 2012, Elaine and Mark attended a custody hearing in the La Plata County Court of Durango. After a private conversation with the parents regarding Dylan, the judge granted Elaine full custody of the 13-year-old. However, he approved a court ordered trip for November, so Dylan was to spend Thanksgiving with his father. 

Dylan’s original flight was scheduled for November 17th, however it was cancelled and rescheduled for the following day, the 18th. Dylan told one of his family members that he hadn’t spoken to or seen his father since the custody hearing. Dylan hadn’t had a great relationship with his father. Cory described Mark as cruel and violent, which was the very opposite of his little brother. Prior to the divorce, Mark had told Elaine that if she did in fact want a divorce, things would get ugly. Dylan wasn’t shy about telling people that he was not looking forward to visiting his father. He’d pleaded with his mother to let him stay home, but unfortunately, Elaine couldn’t let him skip the court-ordered visitation. Elaine’s mother was suffering from cancer and the family believed it might be their last Thanksgiving with her. Dylan was really close to his grandmother and wanted to stay with her, but there was no avoiding the trip.

On Sunday, November 18th, 2012, Elaine dropped Dylan off at the airport and gave him a hug. He boarded the plane to Durango, where his father was waiting for him. At 5:46PM, Dylan arrived at the Durango Airport and was seen walking with his father on surveillance video. At 7:05PM, Mark and Dylan went to Wal-Mart, which was also caught on surveillance video. Elaine texted her son, asking him if he’d gotten to Durango and met his father. Dylan texted back that he had, with a frowny face. The two then went to the drive thru at McDonald’s. Later, Mark said that he’d wanted to go to a sit down restaurant, but Dylan didn’t want to, which annoyed Mark.

The only thing that excited Dylan about visiting Durango was that he’d get to see some of his friends. He’d made plans to spend the night at his friend Ryan’s house, but Mark told him that he couldn’t. He texted Ryan to tell him that he couldn’t come over, but they made plans for Dylan to be over at Ryan’s house at 6:30AM the following morning. Dylan exchanged a few more texts with his mother, however, all messages from Dylan stopped at 9:37PM. The last message that was sent at 9:37PM was believed to be sent from his IPod Touch. The last message sent from his cell phone was shortly after he and Mark arrived at Mark’s home.

At 7:30AM, Mark said that he tried to wake Dylan up to come with him to run errands, but Dylan wanted to stay in bed. Mark went to his work payroll office and his divorce attorney’s office. (These visits were confirmed by investigators) He returned home at 11:30AM and found that Dylan was gone. All of Dylan’s belongings were gone, as well as his fishing pole. Apparently not concerned about his son being gone, he took a nap until about 2:30PM. He later said that he believed Dylan was out fishing or playing alone or at his friend’s house. The friend’s house was almost 6 miles away.

Around 3PM, Mark began looking for his son. He went to Dylan’s friend, Tristan’s house, but Tristan hadn’t seen him. At 4:10PM, Mark went to another friend of Dylan’s, Nando’s house. Ryan was also at Nando’s house, and they both told Mark that they’d been trying to get in touch with Dylan all day, but had gotten no response. Ryan had set his alarm for early that morning, waiting for Dylan to show up to his house, but he never did. At 4:15PM, Ryan texted Dylan and told him that his dad was looking for him.

Around 5PM, Mark went to the Marshal’s office to let them know that he couldn’t find Dylan. He texted Elaine, asking her if she’d heard from their son. Elaine was immediately concerned. She called the La Plata County Sheriff’s Office and reported her son missing. Immediately, she, her husband Mike, and Cory, left Colorado Springs to drive to Durango. Dylan hadn’t even been with his father for 24 hours and he was missing. 

Fuck Mark Redwine

That night, the 19th, The La Plata County Search and Rescue and the Sheriff’s Office searched the area surrounding Mark’s house. They initially believed he might be a runaway, but Elaine was adamant that while Dylan was unhappy at his dad’s house, he would’ve never run away without calling/texting her OR responding to his buddies. Searchers were very concerned…the temperature that night was supposed to drop below freezing. The search coordinator immediately noticed that Mark was behaving strangely. He never came out of the house to help search that evening and never spoke to the coordinator. In fact, he turned all the lights off in his house as though he’d gone to bed.

Elaine and the rest of her family arrived in Durango early on November 21st. Investigators assured Elaine that all sex offenders in the area had been cleared. Initial searches of abandoned buildings, houses, barns, and sheds yielded no signs of Dylan.

The days continued and Mark pushed for the search to center around a large lake about 7 miles from Mark’s home. He said that because he couldn’t find Dylan’s fishing pole, he assumed that his son had gone off to go fishing and had either gotten lost or hurt. The terrain in the area was very dangerous. The road that surrounded the lake dropped off on a steep cliff that led to the bank of the lake.

Elaine, Mark, and Cory were out with the hundreds of searchers, scouring for any signs of Dylan. Elaine did her best to remain positive, but it was difficult. She said that she thought that if she lost hope, everyone else would too. The community held vigils, at one of which Mark spoke in front of everyone about his son. The crowd, however, found it odd that he was already speaking about his son in the past tense. 

Clearly Mark Redwine

It was pretty clear from the moment that Elaine heard that her son was missing, both she and Cory thought that Mark knew more than he was saying. Investigators seemed to think the same thing. When the FBI and the Sheriff’s Department first interviewed Mark, they blatantly asked him what he did with Dylan. He, of course, denied knowing anything more than he’d already told them. He said, “Obviously it’s no secret that I believe Elaine could be involved in this. I don’t know how she would do it, I don’t know who else she’d have involved with it, but I can’t help but think there’s a possibility that she had some involvement.” 

Mark continued, telling investigators that he believed Dylan had run away because of problems he was having with Elaine. Investigators couldn’t find anything to indicate that Dylan was having issues at home or with Elaine. 

Mark retold his account of the night that Dylan arrived many times to investigators. He said that he’d picked Dylan up from the airport, taken him to Wal-Mart to get a few DVDs, then to McDonald’s for dinner. He said when the two got back to his house, they started roughhousing, but nobody got hurt. 

On November 28th, the Sheriff’s Office put out a press release saying that Dylan was not considered a runaway.

A search warrant was executed on Mark’s house, where cadaver dogs alerted to the scent of human remains in the house and in the back of Mark’s pickup truck. They found blood in the living room, but not a significant enough amount to indicate that a crime had been committed. Investigators believed that Mark saying that the two had been “roughhousing” was to cover up for something else. They administered a lie detector test to both Elaine and Mark. Elaine passed. Mark failed, specifically showing deception to the question, “Do you know where Dylan is?”

In a television interview in early December, there was a blanket and pillow on the couch that appeared to have been where someone was sleeping and a cereal bowl on the counter. Mark said that the bowl was what Dylan ate out of the morning he went missing. He also said that the TV channel Nickelodeon was on when he came home from his errands that day. It was found that Nickelodeon on Monday mornings (Monday morning was when Dylan “went missing”) played shows that were geared towards babies and young children. Mark said that his problem is Elaine and doesn’t understand why she seems to be the only one anyone is listening to. 

Search parties continued, however the snow eventually slowed down efforts. Dylan’s friends and family organized a gathering outside of Mark’s house, with Elaine, her husband, and Cory holding signs and chanting for Mark to tell police what happened. Cory even publicly said that he believed his father had something to do with Dylan’s disappearance. Mark continued to tell investigators and the media that all he wanted was for Dylan to come home.

The Pictures (Get ready to vom)

Cory firmly believed that his father knew where Dylan was. But why would Mark have killed his 13-year-old son? Cory felt that he might’ve known why. He told investigators about a road trip he took with Dylan and his father to Cleveland. While in the hotel room late one night, Dylan borrowed his father’s computer. After a few minutes, he called Cory over to look at what he’d found. While looking through Mark’s deleted files, he found several shocking pictures. They were selfies of Mark, while he was wearing women’s underwear. Some of the photos showed Mark wearing a diaper that had feces in it…and in some of the photos…Mark was eating the feces. 

Cory quickly took pictures of the photos on the screen with his cell phone. He told his brother not to tell anyone about the pictures, that he didn’t want Mark to know that they knew. Unfortunately, Dylan was not the type of kid to keep silent, especially when he felt a certain way.

Dylan texted Cory to tell him that was having an argument with their dad. Mark was telling Dylan that Cory and Elaine were a bad example for Dylan. Dylan asked Cory to send him the pictures so he could show Mark that HE was really the bad example. Cory sent them. After hearing this story, investigators felt that this could’ve been the motive, that this was a “weapon” that Dylan held against his father. 

In February of 2013, Elaine, Cory, and Mark all appeared together on the Dr. Phil show. Cory told his father how much he hated him and Elaine told him that she knew he knew more. Mark said that Dylan was everything to him and continued to deny that he knew anything about where their son was. Dr. Phil asked Mark directly about the photos that had now been posted on the internet. Mark said that the photos weren’t genuine, they were fabricated. He said that he knew that Cory and Elaine were coming into his house and rummaging through his things when he was out of town. He decided to create these photos and leave them in his home as a trap for Cory and Elaine to steal, which CLEARLY THEY DID. This is when Elaine said that she realized that her son probably wasn’t alive anymore. 

When investigators asked Mark about the Dr. Phil interview, he told them that he thought it was a public format for Cory and Elaine to accuse him. They gave him several opportunities to tell them where Dylan was, to say that it was an accident, but Mark denied, denied, denied.

Continued Search

One area that searchers wanted to cover was Middle Mountain, however it was closed because of the severe weather. Once the snow melted, they’d be able to access it. In April of 2013, Mike, Elaine’s husband said that he had pulled over on Middle Mountain Road while heading to a search at Vallecito Lake to pee. He saw Mark driving down the mountain in his white pick-up truck. Mark didn’t acknowledge Mike, which Mike found strange, since he was in clear sight of him.

In June of 2013, the son had melted and a 4 day search began with dogs, ATVs, people on horseback, and ropes teams covering the area. While searching, a size 7 youth Nike Air Jordan was found. It matched the one that Dylan owned and that he was seen wearing in the surveillance video at Wal-Mart in Durango with his father. The following day, on June 26th, a cadaver dog alerted to two human bones. While they were being located, more human bones were found. His tattered black T-shirt with a Chicago White Sox logo was also found in the area, along with a shred of underwear and an earbud. DNA from a baby tooth that Elaine provided confirmed that the bones belonged to Dylan Redwine.

One of the investigators called Mark to let him know about the discovery of Dylan’s partial remains. She asked how Mark was doing, to which he responded multiple times that he was “living the fucking dream”. The investigator asked him if he was intoxicated, which he denied (but he sounds like it). He said that (I’m guessing because the investigator was female) that women were only good for one thing and it wasn’t cooking or cleaning. He also said that finding 2% of Dylan’s remains did not constitute as him being found. He honestly sounds fucking insane. 

In August of 2013, Mark’s house was searched for a second time and TWO YEARS LATER, he was officially identified as a person of interest in his son’s disappearance and likely murder. In November of 2015, hikers Dylan’s skull was found approximately 1 mile from where his other remains had been found, which was abou 6 miles via road. The county coroner determined that there was evidence of blunt force trauma to the skull and it was not from animals.

In 2017, a new District Attorney was elected. Christian Champaign was a former Deputy District Attorney, who’d been working on Dylan’s case for quite a while. He made it clear that he believed that things were moving too slowly in Dylan’s case and pushed forward with convening a Grand Jury. In July of 2017, the Grand Jury returned with an indictment of Mark Redwine for the 2nd degree murder and child abuse of Dylan. Mark, who was still working as a long-haul trucker, was found in Bellingham, Washington. He was pulled over in his truck and arrested. When the officer read him the charges, he said he had no idea what the charges were about. Investigators said that they knew Mark had grown very confident that they’d never be able to bring charges against him. He was extradited back to Colorado to face trial. 

The indictment included complaints from his other ex-wife, Betsy Horvath. The two were married for six years and had 2 children together. After their divorce, there were issues that resulted in a custody battle. She felt that it was very likely he could’ve hurt Dylan. She said that he once told her that if he ever had to get rid of a body, he’d leave it in the mountains. Betsy described him as very abusive and said that he would often violate the custody agreement. She said that he even once said that he would “kill the kids before he let her have them”. Betsy expressed her sorrow for Dylan and his family, saying that it really frightened her because it could’ve been one of her children.

The Trial

Mark’s trial was postponed multiple times for several reasons, including Covid and because his attorney was arrested on charges of domestic violence and assault. In June of 2021, the trial of Mark Redwine began. While investigators would’ve liked to charge him with first degree murder, but there was no evidence to prove premeditation. The prosecution showed photos of Dylan and his friends that were taken just before his disappearance. They showed unanswered text messages from Elaine to Dylan on the night that he arrived in Durango. In the last one she sent, she told her son to be safe and that she could come get him if he needed. 

Mark’s defense team said that everyone was prejudiced against him from the start, blaming it on Elaine. They referenced her telling investigators, interviewers on national TV, friends, family, and on Facebook that she believed Mark was behind Dylan’s disappearance. They also referenced the several Facebook pages that were titled with something to the effect of “Arrest Mark Redwine,” etc. The defense wanted to convince the jury that Elaine had a vendetta against Mark from the beginning, which had ultimately led to his arrest.

The prosecution, OF COURSE, showed the photos that Dylan and Cory had found on Mark’s computer. This was in order to show Mark’s motive for murdering Dylan. Cory took the stand to explain exactly how they’d found the photos and what they looked like. He recalled that Dylan was extremely disgusted and that his little brother lost any reason he might’ve had to look up to his dad that night. They played the clip from the Dr. Phil episode where Mark claimed that he’d planted those photos. Cory said that there was absolutely no reason for his father to take or plant those photos. When asked if he still loved his father, Cory was clearly emotional, but said that he did love Mark. He just wished that he didn’t have to be there doing what he was doing. 

In order to show the blood evidence found in Mark’s living room, the prosecution recreated his living room in a courtroom down the hallway, including all of the same furniture and layout. They placed blood spots in the exact same places as Mark’s home. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a significant amount of blood to obviously indicate that a crime took place. A crime scene investigator testified that during his initial walkthrough, he didn’t find any obvious evidence of a violent struggle or event. On cross-examination, a forensic expert said that while blunt force injuries could result in death, they may bleed very little or not at all. 

A forensic anthropologist testified that based on the damage to the skull, it appeared that Dylan had suffered blunt trauma, as well as a skull fracture above his left eye, likely with a sharp tool around his time of death. The defense argued, saying that there were tons of mountain lions, bears, and coyotes in the area where Dylan’s body was found. The forensic anthropologist said that she couldn’t rule out that the damage was from an animal. A wildlife expert also testified that typically those animals didn’t carry things more than a quarter mile away from where they found them, but it’s possible. He said that in his experience, he’d never seen that happen. Additionally, bears would’ve likely been hibernating during the time that Dylan went missing.

Another expert for the defense argued that it wasn’t completely clear when the fracture occurred to Dylan’s skull, that it could’ve happened two or three weeks after his actual death. He also said that it’s not any more unusual to find a skull away from the rest of the remains than it is to find it WITH the remains. He said “the longer a body lays out in the wilderness, the more likely critters will get to it and it’s more likely that different bones will be separated from one another…the longer a body is out there, the more likely it is the skull won’t be found with the other remains.” This went to their argument that animals could’ve caused the damage to Dylan’s skull.

One of Mark’s neighbors was brought in to testify that on November 19th, 2012, around 2AM on the day that Dylan was reported missing, she woke up to use the bathroom and noticed that the outdoor porch light was on at Mark’s home. This was very out of the ordinary. 

The last witness for the prosecution was FBI agent John Grusing. He told the jury about how on the day that Dylan disappeared, Mark took a long nap when his son had reportedly been missing for several hours. Grusing also said that initially, Mark denied that Dylan had any injuries that would’ve led to police finding blood in Mark’s living room. However, he then told him that Dylan had a bad cold sore that was bleeding quite a bit. When Grusing told Mark that he could check with Elaine about the cold sore, Mark said the injury was actually from when he and Dylan were throwing a football in the house. Grusing emphasized how inconsistent Mark’s stories were throughout the investigation. 

Mark made the decision not to testify in his own defense. He never reacted during his trial, never cried, despite the photos that the prosecution showed of his now-dead son. The trial itself lasted for 5 weeks and the jury deliberated for 6 hours. They found Mark Redwine guilty of the second degree murder of his son, Dylan, as well as on the charge of child abuse. Mark had nothing to say in response, however a statement was read that he’d written to his probation officer. He wrote that he was innocent of all charges and said that the conviction was fake, it was a miscarriage of justice, and the trial was a sham. The judge presiding said that he couldn’t remember a criminal showing such an utter lack of remorse and that the community needed to be protected from him. He sentenced him to the max possible sentence, 48 years in prison. He has formally filed to appeal his conviction. The rest of Dylan’s remains and missing belongings have never been found.