The tragic case of Noreen Boyle
Collier was asleep when he heard a loud thud, then another.
Collier panicked. Then, the police received a surge of concerned phone calls from Noreen’s friends.
Noreen’s body was found buried inside the fresh concrete floor of their new house.
Noreen Was Forty-Four
Noreen Marie Schmid Boyle was a forty-four-year-old mother of two.
She lived in Mansfield, Ohio, with her forty-six-year-old husband, Dr. John “Jack” Boyle, and their two children, Collier and Elizabeth.
Noreen was a dental hygienist. Her husband was the most successful doctor in town. He had the largest medical practice in Richland County.
Therefore, the Boyle family lived a comfortable life.
Their children attended private schools. Noreen enjoyed shopping, and she would often take Collier along. But John was a rageaholic behind closed doors. He often took out his anger on either Noreen or Collier.
On one occasion, Collier played video games in the living room. John walked in and began ripping off all the video games.
John threw them at Collier’s head in a violent outburst.
You’re a Stupid Little Fat Boy
“What are you?” John asked Collier. “You’re a stupid little fat boy.” He said.
John: What are you?
Collier: A stupid little fat boy.
John: WHAT ARE YOU? (John asked a lot louder)
Collier: A STUPID LITTLE FAT BOY!
Although the community didn’t know the rageaholic side of their favorite doctor in town, there was a side that John couldn’t cover up. Everybody in town knew of John’s infidelities.
Noreen stayed through everything. However, it didn’t take long for her to realize she had had enough.
John Introduced a Girlfriend to His Son
What happened was that John went as far as introducing one of his girlfriends to Collier. Collier noticed that the girlfriend had a ring similar to his mother’s. So he told Noreen about it.
Noreen could tolerate John cheating behind her back. But now that he had involved Collier in his gross behavior, he had crossed the line.
Noreen filed for divorce. But John convinced her to stay and start over in a new place. He promised Noreen that they would soon relocate to Erie, Pennsylvania, where he had bought a new house.
It was December 31st, 1989. Collier was asleep in his room. Then a piercing scream from his parent’s bedroom woke him up.
Then two thuds followed.
Collier panicked. But he dared not move an inch. He was extremely scared of his father. John walked into his bedroom a few minutes later. He stared at Collier for a while.
Collier pretended to be sleeping the whole time.
Noreen Was Nowhere to Be Found
The next day, Noreen was gone.
Collier gathered the little courage he had. He asked his father where his mother was. “Well, mommy took a little vacation Collier.”, John replied. Collier knew something wasn’t right.
So he grabbed his phone book, where he secretly kept his mother’s friends’ phone numbers. Collier went into the bathroom, locked the door, then called all his mother’s friends.
He told them what had happened.
Collier asked them to call the police. The police went to the Boyle house to investigate. John told them that Noreen found out he was cheating. She got upset and left him.
Now, it wasn’t unusual for a wife to leave her husband on the grounds of infidelity. But John kept asking the authorities about the person who had called them.
He gave a stern look to Collier when he learned that Noreen’s friends called them.
Collier told the authorities that his mother wouldn’t leave him. But he was just an eleven-year-old boy. It was his father’s word against his.
Above that, Collier’s grandmother confirmed John’s story. She stated that she was also present the night when Noreen stormed off. She added that it wasn’t something new to her.
Noreen Once Left in the Same Manner
Three years prior, Noreen left without warning after she got into a fight with John. But she later returned.
John traveled to Erie, Pennsylvania, to work on the new home that he had purchased in the days that followed. Noreen was still nowhere to be found.
The authorities searched the Boyle house two times. But they found nothing suspicious. Then Collier told them details about things that were happening. Collier wasn’t convinced that his mother just left. He suspected that his father killed her.
He had heard loud thuds on the night that Noreen went missing.
Collier also stated that his father returned from Pennsylvania with sore shoulders and arms. Collier had to rub liniment on him.
One of the detectives gave Collier his card to call him.
Collier Was Determined to Find Justice for His Mother
Collier would tell his principal at school to call the detective almost every day. Then he would talk to him about his findings from his little investigations.
Noreen’s case was about to be closed when Collier told the detective about the photographs he had found in his father’s car’s glove compartment.
They were photographs of John and his girlfriend inside and outside the new house in Pennsylvania. The investigators interviewed the girlfriend. She confirmed that she had an affair with John. And she was pregnant at the time.
Meanwhile, John suspected that Collier was snitching on him.
He told Collier that they were going to go to Florida the next day. Collier called the detective he was working with and told him what was happening. The detective suspected that John was about to kill his son.
So, Collier was placed in foster care the following morning.
The Police Continued Their Investigation
The investigators talked to the real estate agent who had sold John the house.
The agent confirmed that John came with his girlfriend for the purchase, not his wife. John never intended to move into the new house with Noreen. The agent also told them that John pressured her to move in early by January 1st.
Then John asked the agent what he would hit if he broke into the basement floor. What was underneath the floor?
The agent couldn’t understand why anyone would want to do that.
The police then asked around hardware stores. They wanted to know if anyone had recently bought supplies commonly used to dispose of a body, like a shovel.
The investigators found out that John rented a jackhammer two days before Noreen disappeared.
The authorities obtained a search warrant for John’s new home. They brought a crew of technicians equipped with shovels and pickaxes.
John’s whole basement had already been renovated. The floor was freshly painted gray. There was green carpet over most of the area. But a part of the floor was covered in new concrete, soft, and there was a little depression.
The crew dug it up.
A foul smell soon struck them. There was a body embedded in the concrete. However, it had decomposed beyond recognition.
The Aftermath
John was arrested.
Collier testified against his father in court. And both sides of his family cut ties with him.
Collier had lost his mother and was about to lose his father. And nobody wanted anything to do with him. Meanwhile, the technology at the time wasn’t advanced enough to determine whether the remains belonged to Noreen or someone else.
Nonetheless, John was found guilty of murder and sentenced to 20 years to life in prison.
The remains of the body were exhumed four years later. A DNA test confirmed that the remains belonged to Noreen.