With the help of the FBI, a forensics expert at the University of Florida School of Medicine and family members of the victim, the Missouri State Highway Patrol has identified a woman who was found dead in Shannon County more than two years ago, and charged her brother with first-degree murder.
Public court records show the deceased woman is is Debra J. Ramsey, 64 at the estimated time of her death, of Alton.
Robert C. Bender, 60, of Alton, has been charged in Oregon County with stealing $25,000 or more and first-degree murder, and in Shannon County with felony abandonment of a corpse. It is believed he killed Ramsey, stored her body, then moved it to a right-of-way along east U.S. 60 in late December 2021 or early January 2022. He was arrested Wednesday, according to the patrol, and court records show he is held on two no-bond warrants out of Oregon and Shannon counties.
Bender is also suspected of stealing her Social Security Disability payments, almost $50,000. The victim and Bender reportedly lived together in Alton and it is suspected Bender took the money from an account at Alton Bank.
An investigation into the missing money was initiated after the victim was positively identified using genetic testing in mid-May. The testing came after a meeting with the victim’s daughter in April, in which the daughter reportedly described circumstances that led her to believe Bender killed her mother.
Ramsey was found by Missouri Department of Transportation workers mowing the right-of-way on Jan. 12, 2022, in Winona in Shannon County. An autopsy revealed the cause of death as multiple gunshot wounds, but the victim remained "Jane Doe" as some information was made public in the hopes someone could identify her.
A statement submitted to prosecutors by patrol investigator Cpl. Evan Tyrell noted her fingers had been "mechanically removed" and have not been recovered.
Tyrell said around Jan. 20, 2022, he spoke with a doctor at the University of Florida School of Medicine after submitting information about the body and was told it had probably been placed at the roadside sometime between Dec. 25, 2021 and Jan. 2, 2022.
The doctor also said she believed the body may have been stored somewhere, possibly a freezer or cooler, before it was moved, noting the ends of where the fingers had been removed appeared to be “slightly mummified.”
A possible witness was identified after several months of investigation, Tyrell said, and spoken to in person on April 23. The witness, the victim's daughter, said it had been over a year since she had last spoken to her mother and hadn't been able to contact her despite several attempts. She said she had last seen Ramsey around Dec. 13, 2014, and talked to her on the phone occasionally. She also said her mother lived alone with Bender, according to Tyrell’s statement..
On May 25, 2023, she said, she and her husband and aunt went to Bender's house in an attempt to contact Ramsey, but he wasn't home at the time and they walked around the house. She said she saw a deep freezer sitting outside of the house near the wood line and thought it was unusual because it was normally in the kitchen.
She also said she looked through a window and saw that the door to her mother's bedroom had been boarded up, which she also thought strange. She said Bender showed up and said ,”Oh, sh**” when he saw the visitors, and later explained without being asked that he had boarded up the door to the bedroom because there was a hole in the floor.
She said no one mentioned they had noticed it, he wouldn't let any of them in the house and kept referring to her mother in the past tense, also things she found odd.
Bender reportedly told them the victim had moved to Florida with a boyfriend who was retired from military special forces, and that the boyfriend would mail him a "burner phone" every month so he could keep in contact with Ramsey.
Bender also reportedly told the witness the boyfriend would tell him how much money to send to the victim each month and he would withdraw the cash and mail it to Florida, and at one time told the witness that Ramsey told him to keep and use a debit card while she took the checkbook to Florida.
The witness told Tyrell her mother had lived in Florida, but it was about 30 years prior, she had a disability and walked with a cane, and she didn't have any boyfriends.
She also reportedly said Bender and her mother didn't get along very well and had regular "intense" arguments that frequently escalated to the point they would threaten to kill each other, but the fights never became physical as far as she knew.
She said she believed Bender had been living off Ramsey's Social Security Disability Income and that she thought he might have killed her mother, Tyrell stated.
The witness provided a DNA sample for testing and results indicated the near-certainty the woman found in 2022 was her mother. After Ramsey was positively identified in mid-May, a Social Security special agent told Tyrell she had been receiving about $1,600 a month in disability income that was being deposited in Alton Bank.
Records provided by the agent also showed the victim's signature had apparently been forged sometime in 2023 on paperwork terminating a state-provided drug benefit with the note that it was no longer needed by the victim and a statement that "The lord shall provide."
It was dated as being signed by the victim on July 31, 2023, well after Ramsey was found dead. Alton Bank, providing information to investigators, said the account balance was only about $5 as of July 3, indicating someone had been withdrawing the Social Security funds being deposited.
Surveillance videos showed Bender using the victim's debit card to withdraw funds and the estimated amount of money stolen is at least $49,910, Tyrell reported.
A bank employee also told investigators Bender would come into the bank monthly to discuss a loan the victim had with the bank, and the employee said she had repeatedly asked for Ramsey to come in and sign and review documents. She reportedly added she had been told as recently as July 3 that the victim was living somewhere between Texas and Florida, Bender didn't know where she was at any given time and he had contact with her through "burner phones" left on his porch by her "special forces" boyfriend.
Bender reportedly told the employee recently that he had spoken to the victim and she didn't want to come to the bank to sign documents.
On Monday Tyrell, along with the assistance of the FBI Evidence Response Team out of St. Louis, executed a search warrant at a location in Alton and seized several items of evidence and firearms, including stained ceiling drywall from the victim's bedroom that presumptively tested positive for the presence of blood.
During questioning, by law enforcement Bender reportedly never denied killing Ramsey, but said he would not tell them what happened, not because he couldn't but he wouldn't, because telling them "would not help him."
All three charges were filed in by Shannon County Prosecutor William Seay, appointed as a special prosecutor. The warrants for Bender’s arrest have no bond attached to them.
