A flurry of subpoenas, discovery responses and a motion to compel are among the pre-trial filings for the second-degree murder trial of William J. Cumber — now set for the end of October.
Cumber is accused of killing Sabine Musil-Buehler, who disappeared on Election Day, Nov. 4, 2008.
Since the trial was previously set for April, it is the second time in six months the state has issued subpoenas ordering the appearance of dozens of witnesses. In March, the defense filed a witness list of 16 law enforcement personnel and 14 civilians.
Two alternative time periods have been scheduled for Cumber’s trial, one starting Oct. 20 and a second Oct. 27.
An Oct. 7 docket sounding before 12th Circuit Judge Charles E. Roberts — occurring after The Islander press time — is expected to determine the trial date.
“I’m not sure if it’s going,” assistant state attorney Art Brown said. “But I’m preparing like it will.”
Assistant public defender Carolyn Schlemmer previously represented Cumber, but she is on medical leave and the case has recently transferred to Franklin Roberts.
The newly assigned assistant public defender, who declined to speak to The Islander last week, filed a motion to compel from the state, including requests for:
• A video-interview of the defendant taken at Charlotte Correction Institution April 9, 2012, where Cumber was serving time on an unrelated arson conviction.
• Financial, medical and life insurance records of Thomas Buehler, the victim’s estranged husband.
• Reports prepared by Peter Rampone, an MCSO investigator who has since retired.
• A photograph of a boat on Thomas Buehler’s property.
• A report by a crime scene expert.
Brown responded to Roberts’ motion in an Oct. 1 email, stating:
• Investigators did not record the referenced interview.
• Certain insurance records had been provided.
• His office is checking on supplemental records related to Rampone.
• His office is sending photos from a website.
• The crime scene expert said in a deposition he did not produce a written report.
Cumber’s case took on legs when Manatee County Sheriff Brad Steube announced the second-degree murder charge during a news conference in October 2012, nearly four years after Musil-Buehler was last seen.
Cumber reportedly was the last to see Musil-Buehler that day at the apartment they shared in the 200 block of Magnolia Avenue in Anna Maria.
Musil-Buehler owned and operated Haley’s Motel in Holmes Beach with her estranged husband Thomas Buehler, as well as a residence in the city. The home is in foreclosure, and set for trial Oct. 14, according to Manatee County website records.
In the early days of the investigation, MCSO Detective John Kenney spoke to Cumber in the Magnolia Avenue apartment and became suspicious after smelling bleach during the interview.
Kenney, now part of the Manatee Homicide Investigative Unit, and formerly a sergeant stationed in Anna Maria, later became lead detective in the Musil-Buehler investigation after Detective Ricardo Alvarado was promoted and Sgt. Rampone retired.
Kenney said he believes Cumber used Musil-Buehler’s car to dispose of her body somewhere on Anna Maria Island shortly after she went missing.
“There are lots of places on the island that she could be buried,” he said.
Musil-Buehler’s car was located in Bradenton Nov. 6, 2008 — with portions of the seats and carpeting pulled out and human blood on the driver and passenger seats as well as the driver’s seat belt — when an MCSO patrol officer stopped Robert Corona, 38, of Bradenton, for driving it without taillights, according to MCSO Detective William J. Waldron’s Nov. 8, 2008, report.
Corona was regarded as “a person of interest,” and not a suspect in the Musil-Buehler’s disappearance, according to the report.
Two days after Musil-Buehler was last seen, MCSO alerted Thomas Buehler that her 2000 white Pontiac Sunbird convertible had been found, and he filed a missing person report.
A suspicious fire at Haley’s Motel Nov. 16, 2008, added to the mystery.
To date, officials from the Holmes Beach Police Department, West Manatee Fire Rescue District and the MCSO say they’ve received no results from the state fire marshal investigation. A call to the state fire marshal’s office from The Islander was not returned by press time.
Musil-Buehler is presumed dead, and over the years, investigators have searched for her body in several areas with bulldozers, cadaver dogs and ground-penetrating radar, with mixed results. And despite hundreds of hours of effort, she has not been found.
Last month, the MSCO searched property on the north end of the island near Galati Marine after a worker on a water main project found a fragile pair of women’s underwear. Investigators are awaiting the lab’s DNA analysis on the finding, Kenney said.
The investigation on the undergarment discovery was preceded by another nearby dig in March because one of the victim’s last cellphone calls pinged the location off of a Terra Ceia cell tower.
MCSO public information director Dave Bristow said chances are “very low” that the FDLE lab will connect the underwear to the case.
In July 2011, the MCSO conducted an extensive search of the shore near Willow Avenue in Anna Maria after a homeowner found several of Musil-Buehler’s possessions in a woodsy shore area.
At the time, Kenney told an Islander reporter the evidence found was “pretty significant.”
On the other hand, he said investigators found nothing after its first search in 2008 on the beach near the Magnolia Avenue apartment, where her car had been ticketed around the time of her disappearance.
Cumber is being held in the Manatee County jail without bond.
He was transferred from the Florida Department of Corrections state prison in Punta Gorda after Manatee County pressed its second-degree murder charge in connection with the presumed death of Musil-Buehler.
He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted.
The Oct. 7 docket sounding was to begin at 9 a.m. at the Manatee County Judicial Center, 1051 Manatee Ave. W., Bradenton.