encounters just off highway 141 starting at 4:00 that morning. a place which, by all rights, cory rose, cop number one, should never have been that particular morning but life happens to everybody, and early on the 8th of may 2014, officer rose was adjusting. as i was traveling back from the hospital in des moines my fiancée s grandma was ill in the hospital reporter: still in his own clothes, not in uniform yet, he was on his way to a 5:00 a.m patrol shift in the town of boone, 25 miles or so up the road where officer rose is an investigator with the local police department. and it was very dark on the highway, no moon at all at that hour so he almost missed it there in the ditch maybe 30 yards off the pavement. and what did you see as i was traveling up the road i saw a car, it would be off here to our to my right, sitting on top of the ditch just on the other side
but the public s not in any danger we think what happened in grimes is related to this, and it s an isolated incident. reporter: and they re just walking up and down. just walking the fields reporter: looking for something? you know, in a line, so they don t miss anything. kind of how they do it if there s a missing child but we thought maybe they were looking for a gun or a weapon. reporter: good guess. in fact, that small army of cops was looking for anything that looked like evidence because hours earlier, david moffitt s car went off the road around here. and facts were piling up moffitt had worked with justin, dated angie, and wrecked his car the morning of the murder just six miles away of course, that piqued our interest very quickly. that moved david moffitt to the top of the list. reporter: polk county prosecutors steve foritano and bret lucas had been involved all along. we sent the detectives and the patrol officers to that location, highway 141, to see what
we think what happened in grimes is related to this, and it s an isolated incident. reporter: and they re just walking up and down. just walking the fields. reporter: looking for something? you know, in a line, so they don t miss anything. kind of how they do it if there s a missing child but we thought maybe they were looking for a gun or a weapon. reporter: good guess. in fact, that small army of cops was looking for anything that looked like evidence. because hours earlier, david moffitt s car went off the road around here. and facts were piling up. moffitt had worked with justin, dated angie, and wrecked his car the morning of the murder just six miles away. of course, that piqued our interest very quickly. that moved david moffitt to the top of the list. reporter: polk county prosecutors steve foritano and bret lucas had been involved all along. we sent the detectives and the patrol officers to that location, highway 141, to see what else they could find in that ar
criminal record. so should detectives add him to their list of suspects or what? at this point, i don t know if i have the complete story regarding dave or not. reporter: coincidences. sometimes they come in clusters, don t they? not long after angie s memory coughed up the name dave moffitt, there was another coincidence. we figured we needed to continue and focus on dave and see where that leads us. the first thing that was done was a background make-up of dave to include to see if he had a weapons permit. and so while that check for the weapons permit was being conducted, another office person heard the name and recognized dave moffitt. and she immediately said, he had a car impounded this morning. not only was it impounded, it was impounded approximately within 30 minutes of the homicide. approximately 4:00 in the morning. and it was six miles approximate north of where the homicide occurred. and dave moffitt resided approximately 28 miles southeast of where the homicide occu
there could be clues still on highway 141, and surprises too. one of those surprises, this crinkled receipt. see why it would raise more questions than it would answer. the media people, angie and marie saw hovering around the patrol cars they were placed in that awful may morning had no idea what had just happened to justin michael s bedroom middle of the night. the reporters knew only this they d been sent here because of a suspicious death, and it was related somehow to this house. then as he waited for somebody to tell them something, they got a tip. local reporter stephanie moore. we heard that sheriff s deputies were walking the fields along highway 141. so that would be the highway you would take from des moines to go to grimes. and they were just walking these fields. and we asked them, are you looking for a body? no. are you looking for someone? no. are you looking for a weapon? we can t say. but the public s not in any danger.