Politics & Justice in the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office

The Murder of Lynne Friend

I wanted a photograph of Lynne to accompany the posts on the case but there are none available on Google Images or Yahoo. There is no website memorial to her either. The only mention I found of her were two or three ancient articles from the Sun-Sentinel. I was surprised and saddened. There was saturation coverage of the case in the media in 1994 and some follow-up in later years on the anniversary of her disappearance.

It has been sixteen years though.

Any murder is a significant public occurrence. The most fundamental value of our society, the sanctity of life, is involved. This murder is particularly significant because justice is another fundamental value of our society and is the value that animates our legal system. Justice is about memorializing: we care enough about life to remember. There is not even that in Lynne's case. But justice is not just memorialization; justice is memorialization plus accountability. Friends and family and a life-revering public can memorialize but for accountability there must be government action. Sometimes accountability is impossible, there is not enough evidence to hold someone accountable. Sometimes justice is thwarted or delayed unconscionably even when there is enough evidence. Then the government should be held accountable.

Lynne Friend's murder is about all of these things. I decided to write about it in the beginning of this year but did not. I will begin writing about it one month to the minute from the time this post is published. Sixteen years is far, far too long. No more.

Anyone with a photograph of Lynne, please send it to me at this blog's email address, Publocc@gmail.com.

Politics & Justice in the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office

The Murder of Lynne Friend

From the Sun-Sentinel, April 13, 1995.

A prosecutor is hoping to use her skills as a circumstantial evidence expert to crack the case of a missing Hallandale woman.

Lynne Friend, a 35-year-old hospital marketing director, disappeared on Aug. 28. She was about to be remarried after winning a bitter custody battle with her ex-husband, Clifford Friend.

Lynne Friend is presumed dead, though her body was never found.

But that hasn't stopped Susan Dannelly, a Dade County assistant state attorney, who took over the case earlier this year.

``I became intrigued by the case and asked to work on it,'' Dannelly said. ``There's a lot of possibilities here.''

Dannelly said it is possible to convict someone without finding a body. That's where the circumstances surrounding a death come in.

``She [Lynne Friend) has disappeared under extremely suspicious circumstances. A prosecutor can't look at it any other way. I don't think she disappeared willingly. There's a sinister overtone,'' Dannelly said.

Dannelly said she got a funny feeling when she saw news footage of Clifford Friend with his 5-year-old son, Christian, at Miami International Airport a few days after his ex-wife's disappearance.

Dannelly said she got the same feeling when she heard about the case of Ted MacArthur, a former Metro-Dade police detective, whom she helped convict in 1993. MacArthur is serving life in prison for shooting his wife in 1989 and making it look like an accident.

``It all struck me as odd. [Clifford Friend is) a suspect,'' Dannelly said.

Clifford Friend was seen with a friend dumping a large object into the ocean off the coast of Miami the day of his ex-wife's disappearance.

Michael Petit, Clifford Friend's attorney, scoffed at the MacArthur analogy.

``I don't know how anything in Cliff's case reminds her of MacArthur's case,'' Petit said. ``We'll investigate this case until we know the truth about what happened,'' Dannelly said.

Politics & Justice in the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office

The Murder of Lynne Friend.

Below is from the Sun-Sentinel, a south Florida based newspaper, September 7, 1994.

All Ed O'Dell wants is his fiancee back.

O'Dell is willing to deal with whoever is responsible for her disappearance 10 days ago. Lynne Friend, a marketing employee for Parkway Regional Hospital, was going to marry O'Dell on Oct. 7. Friend, 35, a divorced mother with a 5-year-old son, is described as very responsible and reliable.

Investigators from the Hallandale and North Miami Beach police departments and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are puzzled. On Sunday, investigators searched the North Miami Beach home of Friend's ex-husband, Cliff Friend, and removed some swords, knives and his 1992 Ford Explorer.

Lynne Friend's 1989 blue Mercury Marquis was found abandoned in north Dade County, at Northeast 26th Avenue and 207th Street, police said.

O'Dell, a Tennessee-based executive for a company that builds and designs hospitals, thinks that his fiancee is alive.

"Every day we don't find her makes me more hopeful she's still alive," O'Dell said on Tuesday afternoon. "We will agree to any deal to get her back."

Police are not so sure.

"We're terribly concerned about the well-being of Ms. Friend," Hallandale Police Chief Kenneth R. Wagner said. "We have a lot of suspicions about where she'd be. We're hoping she's OK. We're very skeptical."

Lynne Friend told her friends and O'Dell that her former husband had threatened to kill her on several occasions, starting after she and her husband divorced four years ago.

Within the past few weeks, Lynne Friend told her close friends that she feared her ex-husband would prevent her from moving to Nashville, Tenn., with her son, Christian.

Christian is in the care of Cliff Friend, police said. Cliff Friend could not be reached for comment on Tuesday evening.

O'Dell, though grateful for everything law enforcement officials have done, has hired a private investigator to help find his fiancee.

Lynne Friend's friends have taken to the streets with fliers depicting the missing woman and her car.

Carole Odom, an executive secretary for nursing administration at the hospital, is a close friend of Lynne Friend.

"It is so difficult," she said. "We've gone so many days without anything."

Politics & Justice in the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office

In memory of Lynne Friend, murdered August 28, 1994.