First posted September 14, 2009
Early Sunday morning, September 20, 1992, between 3 and 4:00 am, Eric Stukel wanders into his parents’ Fryn’ Pan restaurant in Yankton, apparently severely under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. His server, Josh Fry, asks him what’s wrong.1
“I think I killed a girl,” Stukel says.1
Josh Fry only knows Eric Stukel as his employers’ son and does not know Tammy Haas at all. Fry does know that Jason Adamson is Stukel’s friend and knows something must be done about Eric because he is wasted, so he goes and tells Jason Adamson what Eric Stukel just said. A look of panic crosses Adamson’s face. Adamson comes out from the back of the restaurant and escorts Eric Stukel away and tells Fry, Stukel was just drunk.
When Tammy’s body is found a few days later, Josh Fry’s girlfriend convinces him he needs to take what Eric Stukel said to the police. He does.
On Friday, Sept. 25th, 1992, two days after Tammy’s body is found, Fry calls Jason Adamson’s house while another party is occurring. Fry tells Adamson that he is going to the police with what Stukel said. Adamson’s response is that a couple of guys were at the party and that he was a little trashed.4
Josh Fry gets up on the witness stand four years later. Defense attorney Mike Stevens cross-examines him about the night in question. Stevens suggests that Fry told the police that Stukel might have said, “I’m thinking of killing a girl,” not “I think I killed a girl.”1
Fry denies ever telling law enforcement such a thing.1
But why did Eric Stukel say: “I think I killed a girl”?
Why didn’t he just say: “I killed a girl”?
Wasn’t he sure of what he had done?
“I think I killed a girl”—it is an odd and troubling turn of phrase.
Perhaps, Stukel knew what he had done but had not come to full terms with how he could have done such a thing. Perhaps, the drugs and alcohol Stukel had taken on Saturday night had clouded his perception enough to make him somewhat unclear about what had happened on Thursday night and why.1
In light of his writings, in light of his improbable tale of taking Tammy back to Yankton,2 in light of the fiber evidence in his trunk and on Tammy’s body,3 in light of his travels on Nebraska Highway 121 that Saturday, what Eric Stukel said to Josh Fry—I think I killed a girl—makes perfect sense. In the Talmud is a proverb: “In came wine, out went a secret.”
WORKS CITED
1. Rothanzl, Lorna. “Friends Testify at Stukel Trial.” Yankton Press and Dakotan. Oct. 2, 1996
2. Rothanzl, Lorna. “Stukel Takes Stand: Prosecution Rests, Stukel Denies Knowledge Of Death.” Yankton Press and Dakotan, Oct. 3, 1996
3. Rothanzl, Lorna. “Experts Testify in Stukel Trial.” Yankton Press and Dakotan, Oct. 1, 1996
4. The party theme continues. Someone was dead. How did these people respond? Let’s party and get trashed. Where were the parents you might wonder? Yep. I wonder too.
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