How a criminal's widow solved a 20-year-old murder

The murder of a young woman and her son, committed 20 years ago, was solved after the widow of the criminal told about the dark secret that her late husband kept.

The murder of a mother and son, committed in 2002, was unexpectedly solved by the FBI. They were approached by Barbara Krusen of Arkansas, who claimed that her late husband, Clarence Krusen, had murdered a young mother and her child twenty years ago, then burned the bodies in a furnace on their family farm.

The case of the disappearance of Angela Mccox and her son, 4-year-old Thomas Michael Retew, was conducted by the state police for 20 years, but there was no progress in it for all these years. The police considered him hopeless-before the widow of the criminal confessed everything. According to her, she was afraid to confess, because she was afraid of punishment.

According to Krusen, she and her husband first met Angela in the fall of 2002, when she worked on their farm. Their relationship was friendly, and Angela even left her son Michael with the couple when she needed to go to California herself.

She and her husband got used to the boy and suggested that Angela leave the child to them for adoption. At first, she agreed, but then abruptly changed her mind. Clarence was very angry at this, and ordered Angela to come and get the baby, as he did not want to be "just a babysitter". But when Angela arrived, he killed them both.

The murder, according to Barbara, took place at the Krusen farm in Alton, Missouri, in December 2002. Michael's father reported him missing to the police even earlier, in September 2002, when Angela left with the child in an unknown direction. The mother of Angela herself did not notice her daughter's disappearance for a long time and reported her missing to the police only in 2004.

After Barbara's confession, Fulton County Sheriff Al Rourke declared the case closed. According to Barbara, some time after the incident, she and her husband moved to a neighboring state, while during the move, Clarence said that the oven should be thrown out "because of what was done in it."

According to Barbara, the murder took place during the night, and for a long time she thought that Angela and Michael had just left. When the truth became known, she was afraid to go to the police. How she learned the truth, she does not say. However, there is no one to clarify the details: the killer, Clarence Krusen, was shot in 2012 during an argument with a customer over payment for work.