Retired Detective Convicted In Case Linked To Unsolved Murder
CANON CITY, Colo. (CBS4)- A retired detective from the Fremont County Sheriff's Office is scheduled to be sentenced later this month after he was convicted on three of four charges involving unauthorized possession of evidence from an unsolved murder case.
The charges that Robert Dodd was convicted on are abuse of public records and two counts of second-degree official misconduct.
Dodd was one of the detectives on the force that has been investigating the still-unsolved 2006 murder of 16-year-old Candace Hiltz. She was shot to death with as many as three guns.
Still unresolved is why did Dodd have evidence from the case in his personal storage locker.
"Why did you have that evidence in your locker?" CBS4 investigator Rick Sallinger asked Dodd outside of the courthouse during an earlier appearance.
"No comment," Dodd replied.
"You can tell us now can't you?" asked Sallinger.
Dodd was put on paid administrative leave in January, retired in April, and moved out of state shortly after.
The Canon City Daily Record reported that he told the Colorado Bureau of Investigation in an interview that he held onto the evidence because he wanted to take more photos of it at a later date, but never got around to it.
Her mother, Delores Hiltz, wants to know why Dodd had the items related to her daughter's case.
"He has destroyed evidence, tampered with evidence… the whole thing is sickening," she said.
More than a decade after the crime, evidence from the case was discovered in a private storage locker belonging to Dodd. It included documents, blood covered items and an ax.
Rick Ratzlaff came to the trial hoping to learn why the items were in the locker he purchased.
"They never really asked why he had this evidence and why he hid it," Ratzlaff said before a May court appearance.
There was more, at a landfill outside of Canon City, evidence from other cases allegedly discarded by Dodd was found.
"Disgusting that he hasn't been charged with that. That's 20 young girls, some under 18," said Hiltz.
As for her daughter's murder, no one has ever been charged.
CBS4's Rick Sallinger is a Peabody award winning reporter who has been with the station more than two decades doing hard news and investigative reporting. Follow him on Twitter @ricksallinger.