Pubdate: Wed, 09 Aug 2006 Source: Wisconsin State Journal (WI) Copyright: 2006 Madison Newspapers, Inc. Contact: http://www.madison.com/wsj/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/506 Author: George Hesselberg Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Marijuana) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?136 (Methadone) FELONY CHARGES IN ROBBERY A marijuana plant heist planned with information provided by an insider went fatally awry one morning in March, resulting in a botched robbery that left three men dead and, this week, criminal charges against the woman who got away. Erin Van Epps, 23, a Dodgeville native, who claimed to be a reluctant tag-along, faces felony charges of theft and burglary, with "party-to-a-crime modifiers" because weapons were involved. The criminal complaint was filed Tuesday in Lafayette County, after five months of investigation by the state Justice Department's Division of Criminal Investigation, and includes a six-page handwritten statement by Van Epps in which she describes the shootings and claims to have warned her boyfriend and another man against the robbery. "When we drove by (the) house the lights were on in a room closest to the road. I told them over and over that there (were) people home, that it was a bad idea," she wrote on March 17, the day after the shootings. Lafayette County District Attorney Charlotte Doherty, asked Wednesday if additional charges would be filed in the case, said "not yet, the investigation continues." According to the complaint, Van Epps, her boyfriend, Jaeson Shepard, 29, and Eddie Harris, 24, drove in two vehicles to the home of Bradley and Jeanna Fandrich on Highway N several miles south of Blanchardville early March 16, according to the complaint and her statement. They knew Fandrich was growing marijuana because, Van Epps wrote, Joe Murphy told her about "taking care of Brad's marijuana plants." According to Van Epps' statement and the complaint, Shepard and another man, Aaron "Buckwheat" Watrud, of Madison (a former roommate of Shepard), talked about stealing Fandrich's marijuana. Murphy is listed in court records as a former roommate of Watrud, and a car registered to Murphy was parked in the Fandrich driveway on the day of the crime. "I heard Jaeson and (Watrud) planning on going to Brad's when nobody was home." She said they drove by the Fandrich home three or four times in preparation after Watrud drew a map. Harris, of Mount Horeb, entered the planning when Shepard asked him if the marijuana plants could be stored at his house. Harris "asked if he could come and Jaeson said OK." Watrud did not show up that night, so the three parked one of the vehicles and drove a minivan past the Fandrich home, where the lights in one room were on, prompting Van Epps to suggest abandoning the plan. In an earlier interview, a roommate of Harris said he thought the three were high on drugs when they left Mount Horeb. Doherty said Wednesday that toxicology reports confirm that but could not be more specific. "But Eddie said he wanted to do it," Van Epps wrote. Harris, carrying a single-shot shotgun and leading, kicked in the door and "they went into the house screaming, 'Get on the floor, we have (a warrant) to search, Lafayette County sheriffs.' " Van Epps said she saw a woman in the hallway, later identified by Lafayette County deputies as Jeanna Fandrich. While Shepard confronted and drew the woman into a laundry room, Harris went into the hallway. Brad Fandrich appeared at the bedroom doorway and started shooting. Van Epps wrote that Harris screamed "I'm shot, what did you shoot me with? Call an ambulance." Van Epps then ran out the door and back to the minivan. Both Harris and Shepard were shot to death. Van Epps waited several minutes, she said, during which she heard more gunshots. Then Fandrich appeared on the porch, saw her in the van and started shooting at her. She drove to Blanchardville, where she waited to see if Fandrich would follow. With several deputies, Sheriff Scott Pedley, the county coroner and his wife in the house, Fandrich was explaining the presence of a cache of weapons and prescription drugs to a detective when he pulled a small handgun from his waistband and shot himself. The next day, March 17, accompanied by her lawyer. William Remington, Van Epps turned herself in to Dane County authorities and supplied the statement. On March 18, state investigators found - after Van Epps made her statement about intentions to steal plants and after a tip from a Fandrich relative - a large, self-contained marijuana-growing operation in a hidden room in the basement. Since the shootings, Van Epps, an admitted heroin user who was on Methadone treatment at that time, has participated in a drug rehabilitation program, testified in a federal drug case against a man convicted selling heroin in Madison and been arrested for violating conditions imposed because of an earlier arrest. Her mother and grandfather died in the past several weeks. While the complaint and her statement fill in some blanks of the crime, there was no new information on the death of Bradley Fandrich. Pedley, in an interview with the Wisconsin State Journal earlier this summer, speculated that given Fandrich's involvement in the marijuana enterprise, if Fandrich had killed Van Epps, "we would never have gotten a call . . . there would be three shallow graves out there and the cars would have disappeared." Van Epps, who had been living in Dodgeville with family members, was not arrested, Doherty said, because she is not a flight risk. She was told to appear in Lafayette County Court Aug. 28. Rebecca Young, the mother of Eddie Harris, said some of Van Epps' statements appear self-serving or "just not possible." Storing the stolen marijuana plants at her son's rented home in Mount Horeb was unlikely because she and her son were moving from that residence on the day before the shootings. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake