The police drew those conclusions in the Benoit case because they had the evidence in front of them to make those conclusions. The three bodies showed various degrees of decomposition and experts could tell when each one of the family died, to a reasonable accuracy. Benoit's wife died first, his son was next and Benoit last.
During the time that his wife was supposed to be in hospital vomiting blood, she was actually dead. The statements about his wife being in hospital were made by Benoit himself to friends he called over the weekend. No one will ever know for sure, but the police did investigate and came to a reasonable conclusion.
In the Snuka case, if the police had investigated thoroughly when his girlfriend was killed, Snuka would probably be serving a life term now. After 34 years, as I've said before, evidence is lost, memories are foggy and they don't have a body to examine. It's turned to dust long before now. Most witnesses to the crime are probably gone as well. In this case they waited far too long to pursue it. Unless they had an admission of guilt, which I don't believe they got, Snuka will go to his grave an innocent man.
I have no idea why they waited so long, but Snuka's girlfriend got no justice from the police or prosecutors paid to do the job. The two cases while being similar couldn't be more different. The WWE as I said on the LD thread where caught in the middle. If they said nothing about Snuka they would have gotten heat, if they did say something they would get heat as well. In this case they did the bare minimum that they could. When Benoit died the whole segment of RAW was dedicated to him, that wouldn't happen in the case of Snuka. I sincerely doubt that anyone will come forward now to cement Snuka's guilt.
Most likely Benoit did it. I blame steroids, rather than dementia, for Benoit's rampage.
However, there has some evidence that the police weren't totally thorough in their investigations.
1) They didn't investigate or thoroughly interview the member of the public who put Nancy's death date, eight hours before it was released to the public. Was this shoddy policing, refusing to accept anyone but Benoit doing it, or did it leak out of the police department itself.
2) Kevin Sullivan, a guy who was once married to Nancy, who hated Chris Benoit and threatened to kill him, was even interrogated or suspected, despite motive- Benoit stole Nancy off him, so Benoit is the "other man", his wife "betrayed him" and Daniel is a product of that union, so he would have motive to kill all three, and set it up so that Benoit is blamed.
Chris Benoit achieved more in wrestling, and stole Sullivan's wife. There would be plenty of reasons for Sullivan to be jealous. Was it enough to kill? Probably not. But the police should have investigated the possibility, and then dismissed it if it didn't pan out.
3) It always seemed strange to me that there was never a suicide note, which explained why Benoit did what he did. The police have never explained what Benoit's motive for killing Nancy and Daniel was. I thought you had to have motive, means and opportunity. Benoit had the last two, but police never said what they suspect the first one might be.
Yet Sullivan had a motive, yet that was never followed up.
4) Police never explained how a guy who was supposedly drunk (empty beer cans was found around his exercise machine) and apparently doped up on steroids (his autospy revealed 11 times the amount of testostorone that the body is supposed to have, which leans towards HGH or some other steroid) was able to murder two people, carefully place a Bible next to each body, and then fashion his exercise machine in such a way as to choke him and kill him. This would require a lucid and clear mind, not one addled with beer and drugs, or someone suffering dementia.
A lot of stuff seemed too considered, too neat, to explain Benoit being drugged, drunk or suffering brain injury. If Benoit knew what he was doing, why not then leave a note, telling the world what he hoped to achieve, or what was going through his demented mind.
5) The police never considered the possibility of a visitor or stranger visiting that day. Maybe there was no forced entry because they knew the visitor and let him or her in. Maybe that is why the dogs didn't bark.
Or maybe Nancy opened the door and the person on the other side was holding a gun, and forced her to open the door and let him in.
6) Did Benoit do it alone, or with help? Ever consider the possibility that someone helped him, and maybe then turned on Benoit and killed him too. Or knows what happened. The police never considered it.
7) The police say it was Benoit who did it, because they found his fingerprints all over his house. I bet my fingerprints are all over my house too, because I touch things in my house without wearing gloves. I bet Nancy and Daniel's fingerprints can be found too. That tends to happen when people live in a home for many years. If that is the best the cops can do, then they have done a shoddy job.
There were not other fingerprints. Ever consider an intruder wearing gloves?
8) Why were the cops in such a hurry to wrap up the investigation. Within two days, they had made their conclusion, and weren't even open to any other possibility. They interviewed no-one, and didn't seem to chase up any leads.
What was their hurry? If there was a murderer who might kill again, then they would need to find out who it is quickly, to catch him before he strikes again. But their suspect was dead, so is unlikely to kill again. So why not take time to cross every "T" and dot every "I". Interview everyone, study evidence, and then make a conclusion. If every possibility was investigated, and it still showed Benoit was the likely culprit, then they would be vindicated. It saves the case being re-opened later, because some new evidence emerges, which, if they were more thorough and took more time, they could cover all bases. I don't seem what their hurry was.
Hell, they publicly announced their conclusion before the bodies were even studied for autopsy. Wouldn't it be better to wait, and find out what happened.
9) If their main suspect is dead, then the case never has to go to court, and the evidence tested. There is less chance of a mistake by police being detected, because there is no-one (like a defence lawyer) to question it.
If I were an Atlanta cop, I would keep up the investigation, even on my own time, to get to the truth. If I reached the same conclusion, it would only be after checking every single bit of evidence, interviewing every other possible suspect, knock on doors in the Benoit neighborhood, to see if anyone saw anything. I would not rest until I knew, in my heart, that there is no other possibility, before I accuse a person, any person, of crimes which will destroy their reputation, career, legacy and life.
Don't forgot, there are some people in jail and some on death row, who are later acquitted of what they did because of shoddy police work. Having a man's legacy, reputation and everything he had and worked for, trashed is too high a price to pay for any chance of doubt whatsoever.
I hope, for their sake, the police have got it right. Imagine if new evidence emerges, making it impossible for Benoit to do the killing, and he was a victim too, not the killer. I wonder what the investigating cops would tell Police Integrity, the media, and the wrestling world then.
The fact is, no-one knows for certain what happened, so no-one can say definitively what happened, not even the police, and not even people saying for certain that he did it.
