Opinion ID: 2590211
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Murders of Dennis Alt and Christopher Schoenborn

Text: In December 1982, Dennis Alt, then 24 years old, lived on a farm in Kent County, Michigan, about seven miles from Grand Rapids. He stood five feet 10 inches tall and weighed 160 pounds. Christopher Schoenborn, then 20 years old, also lived on a farm near Grand Rapids, and knew and was related to Alt. Schoenborn stood six feet two inches tall and weighed 190 pounds. On December 7, 1982, Alt and Schoenborn attended an agricultural convention at the convention hall near the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel. Schoenborn was wearing a Mighty Mac jacket with his name inscribed on a label. Defendant was in Grand Rapids from December 5 through December 8 to attend a seminar for his employer. The seminar concluded on the afternoon of December 7, after which defendant had a business dinner with fellow employee Ronald Titgen and two others. Following the dinner, defendant and Titgen went to Tootsie Van Kelly's bar in the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel, where they spoke with Christopher Schoenborn, a local resident whom they happened to meet, for about an hour. Titgen and defendant spoke with Schoenborn until sometime between 11:00 p.m. and midnight, when Schoenborn left and defendant said he had to make a couple of telephone calls. Titgen then went to his hotel room. Dennis Alt was also in Tootsie Van Kelly's that evening. Dennis's cousin, Thomas Alt, saw Dennis in the bar around 11:00 p.m. Dennis had been drinking and asked Thomas to take him home. Thomas agreed but, after going back into the bar to retrieve his jacket and then paying for a round of drinks for some people he knew, Thomas could not find Dennis. On the morning of December 9, 1982, the bodies of two men, later identified as those of Christopher Schoenborn and Dennis Alt, were found five feet from a road in a vacant field about four miles from the Alt farm and nine miles from the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel. Alt's pants were unbuttoned and his genitals were exposed. He was wearing socks but no shoes. His death was the result of asphyxiation by choking; there were linear pressure marks on the right side of his neck. Alt's blood contained alcohol (0.15 percent) and diazepam. Like Alt, Schoenborn had been choked to death, and there were parallel pressure marks on the left side of his neck. A pen with the insignia of the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel had been inserted up Schoenborn's urethra into the soft tissue of the pelvis, causing extensive hemorrhaging. Schoenborn's blood contained alcohol (0.16 percent), and there was diazepam in his stomach. After defendant checked out of room 1169 of the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel, a housekeeping supervisor found a set of keys, which she turned in to the hotel's lost-and-found department. The keys were for Alt's Ford Bronco and Yamaha snowmobile. Schoenborn's Mighty Mac jacket, identified at trial by his mother, was found in a search of defendant's garage. Schoenborn's key chain and bottle opener were found in the pocket of a sports coat in defendant's home. Schoenborn's boots and belt were also recovered from defendant's home. The prosecutor argued to the jury that the entry GR 2 on defendant's list referred to Alt and Schoenborn.