The Main Line Murders

Part One: Susan, Karen & Michael

On the morning of June 25th, 1979, an anonymous caller would alert police to the discovery of a female body in Swatara Township, Pennsylvania. Over the next several months, one of the most bizarre investigations in state history would begin to play out…

Listen to "The Main Line Murders (Part One: Susan, Karen & Michael)" on Spreaker.

On the morning of June 25th, 1979 (Monday) a call was received by police dispatchers in the area of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The caller - a male that decided to remain anonymous - alerted police to a vehicle in a motel parking lot in Swatara Township, which was roughly halfway between Harrisburg and Hershey.

According to this caller, the woman - who he found in the back of the vehicle, in the trunk - was "sick." But when police arrived at the motel parking lot, just after 5:30 that morning, they discovered that she wasn't sick. She wasn't even alive. Rather, she had been dead for close to an entire day; and her nude body, which had been haphazardly thrown into the trunk of this abandoned Plymouth - showed signs of abuse preceding her death.

Over the next several hours, police would set out to identify this woman, eventually discovering that she was a mother that had gone missing earlier that weekend. Surprisingly, though, she had gone missing with her two children; both of whom were missing from the crime scene entirely and seemed to have vanished into thin air. Their disappearance seems to have been precipitated by their mother's murder, and while investigators have been able to provide some pieces to this puzzle in the decades since, several facets of this story remain unexplained and unsolved to this day.

This is the story of Susan, Karen, and Michael Reinert - also known as the "Main Line Murders."

Susan Gallagher was born in Ridgway, a small town in Northwestern Pennsylvania, to her parents William and Jane Gallagher, who were a newspaper business manager and a school teacher, respectively.

From an early age, Susan (who many knew as just "Sue") seemed hellbent on following in her mother's footsteps and began attending Grove City College to pursue a degree in English. There, she would meet her future husband, Kenneth Reinert, who was enlisted in the Air Force at the time. The two would begin dating as undergrads, and Sue would quickly obtain her bachelor's degree - which she then followed up with a Master's Degree in English from Pennsylvania State University in 1966.

Susan and Kenneth would marry in 1965 (shortly after Sue graduated from Grove City College), and the two would begin moving around to duty stations all over the country. They first moved out to the other side of the country - to Sacramento, California - and then returned to the northeast, living in Rome, New York for a time. They even resided in Puerto Rico for a spell, before settling into the Philadelphia region for good in 1971.

At this point, Susan had established a career for herself as a schoolteacher; having been able to find work during their handful of moves. But more personally, she had also become a mother twice-over, giving birth to a daughter named Karen and then a son named Michael (who was born just about a year after Karen). The two were incredibly young when, in 1974, Susan and Kenneth decided to separate. Even though their decision would prove permanent, their divorce wasn't finalized until 1976; and, by all accounts, was an amicable split. Neither owed the other any alimony or anything like that, they just weren't a good fit together anymore.

Following the separation, Sue began settling into the region of Ardmore, Pennsylvania; an unincorporated community of Haverford Township, just outside of Philadelphia. There, she lived in a two-and-a-half-story house along Woodcrest Avenue, which would prove to be a good home for herself and her two kids. Susan and Kenneth split custody of Karen and Michael, but the kids stayed with Susan most of the time. They would go over to visit Kenneth every other weekend - and on the occasional holiday - but lived primarily with Susan. Those that knew Susan recall that she wouldn't have it any other way; she spent almost all of her time raising the two kids as well as she could, and spent whatever energy was leftover at work, where she excelled.

Susan had started working as an English teacher at Upper Merion High School in 1971, and continued that work through into 1979. She was well-liked and adored by all of her fellow staff members and students, who often teased about her squeaky voice, which had a tendency to crack whenever she got enthused or flustered. But she accepted the ribbing in stride, and it became part of her reputation as a teacher; someone that was able to bond with the students on their level, and was able to inspire them by personal connecting with each student.

In addition to working as an English teacher, Susan also supervised several clubs and groups, including serving as the co-adviser for the school's yearbook. She also taught a film class of her own making, which had been inspired by her own love of filmmaking. Needless to say, in her nearly decade-long career as an educator, she had become an integral part of Upper Merion High School, and according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, had been:

"... involved in a project to restructure high school curricula throughout the state to make them more responsive to students' needs."

Neighbors of Susan would recall her as being someone that generally kept to herself on a daily basis. One neighbor in particular (who spoke to the Philadelphia Inquirer) later described her as a "quiet, passive-type person" who enjoyed reading, going out to see plays, and watching films.

"She was active in Parents Without Partners and was constantly chauffeuring her children to gymnastics and baseball games. She was just a very nice person."

One of Sue's outlets was Parents Without Partners, which was equal parts social and support group for divorced or single parents. Not only did Sue become an active member of this organization, but she would become an integral part of the Valley Forge chapter; training people throughout Pennsylvania in how to moderate group meetings, and constantly organizing events throughout the region.

A fellow member of Parents Without Partners would later describe Susan as:

"... somewhat avant garde, but very reserved. She was a very petite, private person."

Sue, who had just lost her mother months beforehand (having received a sizeable inheritance as a result), had begun to rely more and more on Parents Without Partners to help overcome her loss.

Because of the age of Susan's children - Karen and Michael Reinert - not much is truly known about them. The two hadn't grown old enough to truly establish life stories or fully-realized personalities of their own, but what we do know paints a portrait of lives that were full of potential.

Karen, who was 11 years old as of June 1979, was described as being very much like her mother. She was petite and shy, but was no stranger to athletics, having actively participated in gymnastics and softball throughout her youth. While she enjoyed playing sports, her true passion came in the form of arts and crafts, and she seemed to enjoy activities that made her mother proud; just like her mother and grandmother before her, it seems like Karen had been interested in pursuing teaching as a career.

Michael, on the other hand, was a rambunctious 10-year-old who was described as almost the polar opposite of his mother; very outgoing and constantly active. Like his sister, he was active in several sports but seemed to have an unending passion for baseball. Friends and family would later remember him being a fanatic of the Philadelphia Phillies, and he was able to recite their lineups with ease.

Both kids attended Chestnutwold Elementary School, which was roughly a quarter-mile away from Susan's home in Ardmore. Karen and Michael had both just wrapped up their school years, with Karen preparing to move onto junior high (having finished her 6th-grade year) and Michael having two more years left before he could do the same (having finished the 4th grade that June).

On June 22nd, 1979 - a Friday - Susan and her two children were seen alive for the very last time.

Throughout the day, Michael had been with his father, Kenneth, who worked as a senior personnel officer for Fidelity Bank in another suburb near Philadelphia. That evening, the two had participated in a father-son softball game together, but Susan had shown up to pick up Michael, bringing an end to their participation in the game. At around 8:30, Michael would call Kenneth at home, and apologize for having had to leave the softball game early.

Sometime that evening, Sue would call her former in-laws, Florence and John Reinert, with whom she had remained very friendly even after her divorce. While talking to them, she asked if she had enough gas to drive to Allentown, Pennsylvania, and back (a town about an hour north). The US was going through a major gas crisis at the time, which made petrol expensive and hard-to-purchase, so she wanted to make sure she had enough gas before making the drive. Since she had close to a full tank, it was believed that she had more than enough to make the drive to Allentown that weekend and then drop off the kids at their grandparents early the next week.

The reason for the trip to Allentown was a Parents Without Partners conference that Sue had been looking forward to for quite some time. She was actually signed up to moderate a workshop, and had registered her two kids for some events that weekend, but were set to leave early on Saturday morning and return later that weekend.

Neighbors would later spot 11-year-old Karen and 10-year-old Michael outside that Friday evening, at around 9:00, picking up hailstones left behind by a summer storm. About half-an-hour later, neighbors recall hearing what sounded like the ignition from Susan's orange-red Plymouth Horizon, which had a very distinct sound when it started. Minutes later, they would notice that the hatchback was missing from Susan's driveway, leading to the popular theory that Susan had left home with her two kids, likely headed over to visit with her boyfriend that evening.

For several years, Susan had been carrying on an affair with a coworker of hers, William Bradfield (who often went by "Bill"). The two worked together at Upper Merion High School as English teachers, and Bill was actually the chair of the school's English department. The two had started to see each other back in 1974 when Susan was still married to Kenneth, and it is believed that this affair had ultimately led to their separation and divorce.

Nonetheless, Susan and Bill had continued to see each other in private. They didn't want to disclose their relationship to their coworkers - at least, not yet - and had tried their best to keep their romantic entanglements from interfering with their careers or reputations. However, those that were close to Sue would later recall that this relationship had been escalating in recent months, and rumor had it that Sue and Bill were preparing to get married. At least, that was what Sue thought at the time.

What Sue didn't know was that she was just one of several women that Bill had been dating at the time, including one of their fellow English teachers, with whom Bill had been carrying on a secret relationship with for the better part of a decade. That was just one of the many skeletons in Bill's closet that would be exhumed over the next several years.

It is unknown where Sue had gone this evening with her two children, but it was believed that she had gone to visit with her boyfriend/unofficial fiance, Bill. But after leaving home at around 9:30 PM that Friday evening, neither Susan nor her two children would be seen alive again.

Three days later - on June 25th, 1979 - an anonymous caller would alert police to the discovery of a nude female body in Swatara Township, Pennsylvania.

The caller, who chose not to identify himself, told police that he had discovered a "sick" woman in a motel parking lot. Police would arrive a short time later, just after 5:30 AM, at the Host Inn motel, a large convention-center motel roughly three miles away from the Pennsylvania Turnpike's interchange in Harrisburg. There, they would easily find the orange-red Plymouth Horizon in the motel parking lot, with the hatchback left open, revealing the nude woman's body inside.

Police would not initially reveal any specific details about the woman's death - such as the means or whether she had endured any type of abuse preceding it - but would state that there were signs of trauma preceding her murder. The remains would be identified later that day by Susan's ex-husband, Kenneth.

Missing from the scene entirely were Susan's two children, 11-year-old Karen and 10-year-old Michael, who had both gone missing earlier that weekend. Police would spend the next several hours attempting to track down the children, believing (or hoping) that they might have been left with a babysitter. But none of Susan's usual babysitters, friends, or family members had seen the children that weekend, and it wasn't believed that she had left them with anyone. Wherever she had gone, she had likely taken the kids with her.

State Trooper John Holtz from the Harrisburg Barracks told the Philadelphia Inquirer that day:

"We're hoping that (the children) will be at a friend's house. We doubt it very much, but we're hoping for that."

Those that knew and cared for Susan Gallagher Reinert were in disbelief that this could happen to her, of all people: a hardworking, caring single mother whose children and students were her life.

One neighbor told reporters with the Philadelphia Daily News:

"Sue was the last one you'd think this would happen to. She was so cautious. She was careful about who she was with. That's the way it was."

Another neighbor (who declined to be identified) was quoted in the same article as saying:

"I can't imagine (the killer) was someone she didn't know. Her children were her social life. She didn't go out to bars. She called them a 'freak scene.'"

The weekend of her death, Susan had been scheduled to present a workshop at the Parents Without Partners conference in Allentown, but had been a no-show for the event, causing concern from some; as she had become an integral part of her local chapter in the months before her death. She had also made arrangements for Karen and Michael to attend children's programs at the conference, but they too had been missing that weekend. Additionally, they had not checked in at the motel that Sue had reserved weeks prior; which was not the Host Inn in Harrisburg, where her body was found, but a George Washington Motor Lodge much closer to Allentown.

However, as investigators would soon learn, Sue had attempted to cancel her plans that weekend, having spoken to a woman organizing the conference and attempting to find a replacement to moderate her workshop that weekend. She had spoken to this woman over the phone that Wednesday, telling her that she had an appointment scheduled for that Friday evening that might cause her to be delayed.

Investigators would also learn that Sue had called the motel in Allentown, telling them that she had to cancel her plans. That call had also come during the week, well ahead of her last known sighting. The reason for this cancellation would pique the interest of investigators, who attempted to retrace Susan's last steps that weekend.

For the foreseeable future, the case would be handled by Pennsylvania state troopers, who had been dispatched from the barracks in Harrisburg and were among the first at the crime scene that Monday morning. They were soon joined by troopers from the Belmont barracks, as well as other officers and investigators from multiple P.D.'s in the Philadelphia area, having to work across county lines throughout the first week of this investigation... which was just beginning to unfold.

The autopsy of Susan Reinert was performed by Dauphin County Coroner Dr. William Bush, who - it's worth noting - was not a forensic pathologist, but an internist. Dr. Bush originally determined that Susan's cause-of-death was due to either strangulation or suffocation, with her having been bound beforehand (likely with a chain). Surprisingly, her body showed no signs of sexual assault, but that did not mean her last hours were necessarily peaceful; cuts and bruises all over her body indicated that she had been beaten before being killed and then placed in the wheel well of her own vehicle.

While strangulation was deemed the most likely cause-of-death, Dr. Bush could not originally rule out suffocation, due to him finding that tape had been placed over her mouth before her death. He theorized that this might have played a part in her murder, likely depriving her of necessary oxygen.

Dr. Bush would conclude that Susan had been deceased for approximately 24 hours when her body was found in the Host Inn parking lot; speculating that her time-of-death had come between 12:15 and 6:15 AM the day prior (Sunday, June 24th). This was at least 27 hours after she had driven away from her home in Ardmore, along with her two children, and created a large window for investigators to have to fill.

Months later, test results from Susan's blood and tissue samples (taken from before her body was cremated) would find that she had been injected with a lethal dose of morphine before her death. A state official would tell the Philadelphia Daily News that there was enough morphine in Reinert's body "to kill her 10 times over," indicating that she had been intentionally overdosed.

The discovery of Susan's body had been preceded by an anonymous caller, who reportedly discovered her body in the trunk of her parked Plymouth Horizon in the parking lot of the Host Inn (just outside of Harrisburg). This person then called police under the veil of anonymity, in a call that investigators described as "very brief." Police would later admit to accidentally erasing the tape of this call, which would become one of the major blunders in this case, as investigators were eager to speak to this person.

When officers arrived at the parking lot at around 5:30 that Monday morning, they found the hatchback from Susan's Plymouth still open. Police were unsure why the vehicle had been driven here, more than 100 miles away from Susan's home; as she and her children had been planning to stay in Allentown (which was about 90 miles in the opposite direction). Investigators checked in with the motel staff and discovered that neither Sue nor her children had stayed there that weekend, and nobody from the area recognized them.

Clerks at the Host Inn had first noticed the car in the parking lot a few hours before the arrival of police but were unsure when exactly it had arrived. Investigators later speculated that Sue's body might have been sitting in the parking lot for the better part of a day, with the killer likely disposing of the car and the body sometime that Sunday.

State Trooper Louis DeSantis later told reporters:

"No one we talked to yet can give us a reason as to why she was in Harrisburg."

Like Susan's two children, police could find no trace of several of her belongings, including her clothes, purse, and eyeglasses (which she wore regularly). And inside the car, police could only find random pieces of evidence; most of which were not even relevant to their investigation. This included: an umbrella, a matchbook cover from a motel in Gettysburg (where Sue had stayed the year prior for a conference), fast food wrappers, an empty Coca-Cola bottle, part of a blanket, a towel, and a blue comb (which bore the name of the 79th Army Reserve Command from Norristown, PA).

The most intriguing thing that police found inside of the car was a rubber phallus, which was discovered underneath the front seat, within the springs. They did not believe that this belonged to Sue but had likely been placed there by the killer in an effort to confuse investigators.

Most frustrating of all was the lack of any real physical evidence. Other than some fibers found on Susan's body - along with a partial fingerprint - police could find nothing in the vehicle that they could link to the potential killers.

From here, investigators began expanding their search outwards, hoping to find out who had driven Susan's vehicle to the motel parking lot. They began asking those in the area whether they recognized the vehicle (and if so, when they had last seen it), and even reached out to turnpike toll collectors throughout the state. Through these avenues, they were unable to learn where the vehicle had come from but did know that the vehicle had been driven that weekend, due to roughly half a tank of gas missing.

Authorities then began reaching out to those that knew Sue: her close friends, family members, coworkers, and usual babysitters. Unfortunately, none of them had thought that anything was out-of-the-ordinary leading up to Sue's murder, and had not seen her that weekend. Many, including Sue's boyfriend at the time, Bill Bradfield, provided a convincing alibi for that weekend.

Police visited Sue's home in Ardmore and discovered that it appeared to be untouched. The doors were locked, nothing seemed out-of-place, and it didn't appear like anyone had broken in or stolen anything. In the kids' bedrooms, they would even find clothes laid out on the beds in neat piles right next to suitcases, indicating that Sue had been packing up their belongings for a weekend road trip before the three stepped out on Friday evening. To investigators, this indicated that whatever had happened to the three had likely unfolded that Friday, after Sue left her home with Karen and Michael (supposedly headed off to visit with her boyfriend).

Investigators were quick to visit Kenneth Reinert, Susan's ex-husband and the father of her two children, who lived in the neighboring town of Narberth. Kenneth had seen both kids and Sue that Friday evening, having participated in a father-son softball game with Michael. However, investigators would quickly eliminate Kenneth as a suspect in this case entirely, finding that he had no financial or personal motive to harm either Sue or the children. He had a good relationship with both of the kids and got on well enough with Susan. Besides, he had remarried in recent years and his new wife had just given birth to another son roughly six months prior, providing him with an alibi throughout that weekend.

Susan's other family members and friends (including her older brother, Patrick Gallagher, who lived out near Pittsburgh) would be questioned by police but were ultimately unhelpful in providing any information about Susan's fate or the whereabouts of her two children.

Over the next several weeks, as investigators probed every facet of this story, they would quickly run out of steam; and with it, any available leads that might have been found. Lt. Herman Faiola, the head of the state police criminal investigation unit in Harrisburg, would tell reporters a short time later:

"There are many things we're checking into and trying to tie together. There's nothing right now that we can put our finger on but we're being very optimistic about it.

"I hope we find the children alive. I don't know in what condition we'll find them in. I even hate to think about what could be. We already know what happened to the mother. She's dead."

In the final weeks of July (1979), roughly one month after the discovery of Susan's body near Harrisburg, investigators would finally unearth a potential motive in this crime: financial gain.

On July 20th, 1979 a lawyer from Philadelphia would file a caveat in Montgomery and Delaware counties on behalf of Susan's ex-husband (Kenneth Reinert) and her brother (Patrick Gallagher). Basically, this caveat was filed to hold up processing any will that Susan might have left behind in either county until these two parties, Susan's ex-husband and her brother could review it. They had chosen to file this in both counties because Susan's home (in Ardmore, PA) was relatively close to the county border, and she could have feasibly filed a will in either.

The following week, it would come to light that just weeks before her death, Susan had changed her will. She had also taken out a couple of costly life insurance policies, naming her boyfriend at the time as her beneficiary; whom she described in her legal filings as her "future husband."

This would lead police to two suspects whose stories were intrinsically linked, and who would dominate much of the conversation in this case moving forward.

William Sidney Bradfield was a charismatic 46-year-old English teacher at Upper Merion High School. Bill (as he was widely known) had been working at the school since 1963 and had carved out a place for himself in the school district as an influential figure.

In addition to serving as the chair of the English department (bringing him in constant contact with Sue), he was also the president-elect of the Upper Merion teachers' union and was expected to take over as president the following spring. He was also close with Jay Smith, who had been the principal of Upper Merion High School for twelve years (until his transfer in 1978).

While Bill and Sue had been working together since 1971 (when she started working at the high school), they had been dating for more than four years at the time of Sue's murder in 1979. In fact, their relationship actually predated Sue's separation from her ex-husband, with the two beginning to see each other back in 1974 (Sue would eventually separate from her husband later that year and agree to a divorce in 1975). Since then, Sue and Bill had been seeing each other regularly, with talk of them taking it to the next level progressing throughout 1979.

According to those that knew Sue, she had been talking quite seriously about marriage, telling them that she and Bill were hoping to get married later that summer; potentially moving to England before doing so. Investigators would later learn that Sue had actually started reaching out to numerous schools in England, hoping to find a job before taking the continental leap.

But little did Sue know that she was just one of several women that Bill had been seeing in the months and years before her death; a revelation that would begin to slowly play out in the press, as details about Sue's final weeks began to shine a light on her complicated life.

In the weeks before her murder, Bill Bradfield had become the beneficiary on a $500,000 life insurance policy taken out by Susan Reinert at USAA. She had also taken out a separate $160,000 insurance policy from a different bank based out of New York. She had even amended her will that spring (May 4th), leaving all of her assets to Bill in the most recent version. This included the $660,000 in life insurance policies, her own personal wealth, and the inheritance she had received from her mother months prior (which included $200,000 in property and roughly $30,000 in cash).

In prior incarnations of her will, Sue had left behind everything to her two children, Karen and Michael. But this amendment, made just weeks before her murder, raised several alarms, and seemed to implicate Bill exclusively, as he had been made the executor of a murdered woman's estate (worth upwards of $1 million) just one month before her nude body was found packed into the back of her own car.

Yet when police spoke with Bill, they discovered that he had been in Cape May, New Jersey throughout the weekend that Sue was killed. And he had people there to verify his alibi, including fellow educators Vincent Valaitis and Susan Myers: both of whom also taught English at Upper Merion High School, and who both happened to live in the same apartment complex as Bill Bradfield.

Susan Myers, in particular, actually lived with Bradfield. The two had attempted to keep their relationship a secret for some time, but that was now exposed as people in the area learned that they had been living together for several years at this point. According to those that knew Susan Myers and Susan Reinert, the two apparently not get along (likely viewing one another as their primary romantic rival), and that contentiousness had actually resulted in a physical altercation between the two in the teacher's lounge in 1977.

Nonetheless, both of these educators claimed to have been with Bill Bradfield throughout that weekend, having arrived at Cape May's Heirloom Rooming House early on Saturday morning (just a few hours after Susan Reinert and her two children had gone missing). However, this was several hours before Susan had been killed - according to the coroner's report - and investigators were able to account for Bill's whereabouts between Saturday morning and Monday afternoon (when he and his fellow educators had returned to the Philadelphia area).

Following the discovery of Sue's body that Monday, Bill became one of the first people that investigators wanted to talk to. But because of his alibi - which appeared airtight, and was verified by not only his fellow educators but others in Cape May, NJ - they were unable to successfully link Bill to this crime. It wasn't until the possible financial motive was discovered the next month, following the unveiling of Sue's will, that police began to give Bill more of a second look. At this point, he had since traveled out to Santa Fe, New Mexico to begin taking summer classes at St. John's College, having departed on a 10:00 PM flight on June 25th... the same day that Sue's body was discovered.

The second suspect was someone that was connected to both Sue and her boyfriend, Bill: their former boss, Jay C. Smith. However, before we dive into his role in this story - and how investigators believed he was connected - we first need to explore a little bit of Smith's backstory.

Jay Smith had been the principal at Upper Merion High School for 12 years. A former colonel in the Army reserves, Smith was known as a very reserved man who rarely socialized with his co-workers; mostly keeping them at arm's length, and rarely talking about his private life with anyone. However, he had sparked up a bit of a friendship with Bill Bradfield during his tenure as principal, but - like all of Bill's relationships - the two tried to keep it on the down-low. While the two were spotted out on numerous occasions, they always described it as a coincidence; even though events in the future would prove that the two were more than just coworkers that constantly stumbled upon one another.

Smith's tenure as principal at Upper Merion High School was known as a bit of a speedbump in the school's history; he had come into his office and relaxed rules across the board for the students, resulting in a record number of disciplinary issues that would damage the school's integrity. However, while Smith was known for his occasionally bizarre behavior, it usually didn't interfere with his professional career... that is, up until 1978 (the year before Sue's murder). That Fall, Smith had been reassigned to the school's district office to serve as the special services coordinator; a move that had been preempted by certain legal issues that Smith was facing.

On August 19th, 1978, Smith was arrested in the parking lot of a shopping mall, having been caught wearing a hood and carrying two loaded pistols while attempting to break into a vehicle. A search of his vehicle at the scene uncovered two more loaded pistols, homemade silencers, bolt-cutters, and numerous illegal narcotics.

Police would then obtain a search warrant for Smith's home, where they found an even more bizarre combination of illegal materials. There, they would find more than three pounds of marijuana, a stockpile of illicit prescription drugs, more firearms and ammunition, and reference material on bestiality, which indicated that Smith was hoping to turn dogs into "sexual surrogates" (according to the Associated Press), an allegation that would later turn into a fact when Smith all-but-admitted that the reading material was his.

I really wish that I was making all of this up, but nonetheless, this combination of items made it evident to investigators that Smith, this once-renowned member of society, was struggling to overcome his wife's recent cancer diagnosis by abusing drugs and alcohol (likely triggering some kind of mental illness that had gone untreated for some time).

However, while searching Smith's home, police would also find security guard uniforms, which connected him to a series of unsolved armed robberies from the year prior; in which a man had posed as a Brink's security guard and stolen tens of thousands of dollars.

During his subsequent trial for the drug possession and firearms charges, Smith had his friend and former-coworker Bill Bradfield testify on his behalf (as both a character and alibi witness). Bradfield, who claimed that he only knew Smith in a professional capacity, was unable to convince the jury of the former principal's innocence, and Smith was then convicted on all charges.

After Sue's murder in June of 1979, several weeks would pass before anyone began to connect the dots between the conviction of Jay Smith, his friendship with Bill Bradfield, and the murder of Sue Reinert... the timing of which seemed to be more than mere coincidence.

On June 25th, 1979 - the same day that Sue's body was found in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania - Jay Smith surrendered to authorities to begin serving his state prison sentence of 2-5 years (which he had received in the preceding weeks). He would turn himself in to authorities in Harrisburg later that morning - roughly 5 hours after Sue's body was found just a few miles away - and in subsequent questioning, would be unable to account for his whereabouts that weekend.

By now, you can probably guess where this is going. Many began to speculate that perhaps Bill Bradfield, Sue Reinert's boyfriend and the beneficiary of her estate valued at more than $1 million, might have roped in his old friend, Jay Smith, to carry out this crime before turning himself in to authorities in the same city. According to this theory, Bradfield had then intentionally left the area that weekend, in order to establish an airtight alibi more than 100 miles away.

While this theory did indeed make a lot of sense at the time - especially since investigators had yet to uncover any kind of motive that wasn't financial - there was not much evidence linking Smith to the crime itself. There was his personal relationship with Sue's boyfriend, his unknown whereabouts the weekend of Sue's murder, and his close proximity to the discovery of her body on June 25th, but there was really only one piece of physical evidence, which seemed more like a coincidence than anything: a blue comb found in Sue's car, which bore the insignia of the 79th Army Reserve Command, the same unit from Norristown, PA that Smith had served as a colonel in.

When investigators caught onto these connections, Smith had already started serving his multi-year prison sentence at the Dallas State Correctional Institution near Scranton, where he would be interviewed on numerous occasions.

In August of 1979, the investigation - headed by Pennsylvania state troopers - gained the cooperation of the FBI. Because Sue's two children, Karen and Michael, had yet to be found, authorities had to assume that they had been kidnapped, making this a federal crime and falling under the FBI's purview.

However, it would later come to light that state investigators had initially requested the help of the FBI due to several "out-of-state connections" that had turned up over the course of their investigation. This included Sue's boyfriend/fiance Bill Bradfield, who had temporarily moved out to Santa Fe, NM in order to attend summer courses. Investigators would arrange numerous trips out there in an effort to speak to Bill, but he would begin to rebuff them; speaking through his lawyer and stating that he would only be interviewed under certain conditions, which the FBI had to agree to in order to gain his cooperation.

More than a dozen FBI agents would begin to contribute to this ongoing investigation, leading to the formation of a joint task force with Pennsylvania state troopers and other local officials. While they continued to probe the connections between the murdered Sue Reinert, her boyfriend Bill Bradfield, and the recently-convicted Jay Smith, the media began to run amok with several theories that were infecting the public discourse. The most prominent among them were reported connections to the occult, which newspapers began to report later that summer.

That August, reporters with the Philadelphia Bulletin would begin to report that Susan had fallen prey to devil worshippers, whom she may have been familiar with. According to the Bulletin, these were:

"... intellectual professionals, not necessarily the types of individuals you would think of as fanatical sex perverts. They did not balk at using animals for sex exhibitions and encounters."

This type of reporting was not specific to Susan's murder (recall the murder of Arlis Perry from 1974, which faced many of the same occult-laced hurdles), but nonetheless, caused a lot of misinformation to begin to circulate about Sue and the circles she had been running in before her death. The Philadelphia Bulletin and other similar outlets would report that she may have been involved in this group beforehand, or had at least been aware of it... an accusation that would turn out to be as flimsy as it was whimsical.

Investigators would discount these rumors almost immediately, believing that any theories about a Satanic cult perpetrating this murder were - in essence - bullshit.

The following month - September of 1979 - members of the investigative task force would comb through the apartment complex that Bill Bradfield live in (as did Susan Myers and Vincent Valaitis, his alibi witnesses). This included the woods behind the complex, where - earlier that month - an anonymous caller had told police the bodies of Susan's two children had been buried. According to the Philadelphia Daily News, this caller had described the kids being buried in:

"... a shallow grave between the apartment complex and a landmark a mile into the woods..."

However, an exhaustive search of the apartment complex and the region around it would prove to be fruitless.

By the end of the month, a grand jury had been convened to evaluate whether or not to proceed with the case that investigators were building. Subpoenas were sent out to multiple witnesses, asking for them to appear before the grand jury to give testimony, and authorities would remain tight-lipped about what this meant. While several witnesses agreed to appear willingly, it would be reported in the weeks to come that others were holding out for immunity deals before testifying... a sign that investigators were potentially barking up the right tree.

Another lead that presented itself in the latter half of 1979 came in the form of Susan's inheritance, which she had received roughly one year prior.

In November of 1978, Susan's mother Jane Gallagher had passed away, leaving behind a significant inheritance for her children. Sue had received roughly $200,000 in property from northwestern Pennsylvania, as well as approximately $30,000 in cash assets, which were transferred into Sue's accounts. However, while this money had made its way into Sue's accounts, it had also found its way out shortly before her death... and that was a thread that investigators were hoping to unravel as the missing funds became the focus of a high-profile civil suit.

You see, shortly before her death, Sue had begun to withdraw large amounts of cash from her accounts, estimated to be roughly $25,000 (most of her inheritance). This had been taken out over several deposits (due to daily limits), but Sue had told the bank employees at the time that she was hoping to place the funds into multiple "high-yielding investments" managed by her boyfriend, Bill Bradfield (whom she described as her "future husband"). Apparently, Bill had promised to handle the transactions for her and was promising that his investments would yield a high enough reward to fund the couple's marriage later that summer, as well as their move to England.

When investigators began investigating this case earlier that year, they had found fake stocks and bonds inside of Sue's home, which they found perplexing at the time. However, they discovered later on that Sue had received these fake stocks and bonds from Bill, who had been responsible for forging and selling them to her. These had been created for mostly-nonexistent companies, and were essentially meaningless, but indicated a long period of fraud perpetuated by Sue's own lover.

This added an entirely new element to this story and seemed to point to Bill deceiving Susan over an extended period of time before her death. That amplified any kind of financial motive that might have already existed and would continue to cast a large shadow over the rest of the story in the months to come.

As the 1970s came to an end and made way for the 1980s, Bill Bradfield found himself embroiled in a civil lawsuit filed on behalf of Susan Reinert by her brother and ex-husband, who were still left without answers for the woman's murder and the disappearance of her two children. Bradfield was called to testify in a Delaware County court and was asked to account for the missing funds; which, by all indications, had been given to him just a short time before Susan's mysterious death, and led to her being given phony stocks & bonds... which police believed had been fabricated by him.

Even though Bradfield was still technically the executor of Sue's estate, it had yet to move past probate because of the ongoing criminal investigation. And with this allegation - that he had mishandled her funds and potentially sold her on fake investments - investigators were curious to hear his explanation.

In March of 1980, Bradfield would be called to testify, and in his first appearance, refused to answer any questions, diverting any inquiries to his legal counsel. His lawyers, meanwhile, refused to admit that he had taken Susan's money but were prepared to negotiate a settlement with the state in order to settle the matter and finally process Susan's will (which would net him more than a million dollars).

The missing $25,000 would remain an unanswered question in the months to come, as investigators began to focus on other possible avenues for their ongoing investigation to take.

In May of 1980 - nearly one whole year after the discovery of Susan Reinert's body and the disappearance of her two children - members of the investigative task force obtained a warrant to search the home that had once belonged to Jay Smith: the former-principal of Upper Merion High School, who had been the coworker and acquaintance of both the victim and main suspect in this case.

Later that month, multiple news outlets would begin to report that investigators had compared fibers on Susan's body to fibers taken from a carpet in Smith's home. Through these alleged tests, investigators had discovered that the fibers matched; seemingly providing a link between the man who stood to benefit from Susan's death (her boyfriend/fiance, Bill Bradfield) and the man that police had long-believed killed her (the convicted armed robber, Jay Smith).

This news would begin to breathe new life into a case that had grown stagnant in recent months and would reignite public interest in the story nearly one year after it started. While this lead seemed poised to provide answers for the loved ones of the murdered Susan Reinert, her case was still months away from being solved... and the disappearance of her two children would become a mystery for another day.

That's on the next episode of Unresolved.

continue to part two

Episode Information

Writing, research, hosting, and production by Micheal Whelan

Published on on May 17th, 2020

Producers: Maggyjames, Roberta Janson, Ben Krokum, Peggy Belarde, Quil Carter, Laura Hannan, Victoria Reid, Gabriella Bromley, Damion Moore, Amy Hampton, Steven Wilson, Scott Meesey, Marie Vanglund, Scott Patzold, Astrid Kneier, Lori Rodriguez, Aimee McGregor, Danny Williams, Sydney Scotton, Sara Moscaritolo, Thomas Ahearn, Seth Morgan, Marion Welsh, Patrick Laakso, Kelly Jo Hapgood, Alyssa Lawton, Meadow Landry, Rebecca Miller, Tatum Bautista, gravityheadzero, Erin Pyles, Jo Wong, Consuelo Moreno, and Jacina B.