Bitter almond smell that solved a crime | Forensic Files

[Music] so many of us have routines things we do daily without thinking twice about it
and while none of us like to think about how we might die one day I think there's
something especially terrifying thinking about one of those routine things resulting in death which is what this
story is about it's also about deceit which on the surface may make you think that it's a story like so many others
where the person who is supposed to love you the most does the unthinkable but there's something about this story in
particular that sets it apart in the most chilling way I'm Olivia Lavo the Creator and host of the case File
presents podcast the Bakersfield 3 I've teamed up with Casey to bring you their stories in a new format Casey and I have
picked some of case file's most memorable cases to be featured here where the storytelling will be a little
bit different mainly you'll have photos and videos guiding you through the story
today's story is based on case File case number 93 Susan snow and Bruce Nicholl at 40 years old Sue snow appeared to
have a great life she and her family lived in a city outside of Seattle Auburn and Washington where Sue had a
very successful career as a bank manager but there was something unpleasant Sue found herself dealing with on a regular
basis headaches Sue dealt with her headaches by taking her pain reliever of choice Extra Strength etcin such was the
case on the morning of June 11th 1986 Sue woke up with a pounding in her head and went to the kitchen and took her
regular dose of a couple pills not long after Sue's teenage daughter heard a loud thump coming from her parents'
bedroom she went to investigate and that's when she found her mother lying on the floor in the master bathroom eyes
wide open with what was described as a frightened expression Frozen on her face Sue was still breathing but barely she
was lifted to a nearby hospital where within hours doctors told Sue's husband and children she was brain dead and the
painful decision was made to take her off of life support now from the time Sue snow was rushed to the hospital
doctors were baffled at what caused her death The 40-Year-Old had no prior health issues and she had no signs of
trauma anywhere on her body so going into the autopsy the pathologist had had no idea what to expect and this is where
something remarkable happened the pathologist assistant Janet Miller noticed a faint yet distinct smell of
bitter almonds during the postmortem examination which immediately made her suspicious see Janet Miller had had a
colleague who had taken their life by ingesting the toxic salt and rapidly acting poison known as cyanide Miller
had learned from that tragedy that cyanide often is described as smelling like bitter almonds according to the
book bitter almonds by Greg Olen Janet Miller mentioned this to the pathologist but they apparently didn't smell what
she was smelling and the pathologist didn't think there were any other signs consistent with Sue snow being poisoned
the pathologist believed that Sue had essentially died from having an irregular heartbeat that resulted in
heart failure but Janet Miller the pathologist assistant couldn't shake that feeling or rather that familiar
smell of bitter almonds so she went to yet another doctor with her concern once again that doctor couldn't smell what
Janet Miller could smell either but based on how strongly Miller felt the decision was made to test Sue Snow's
blood which otherwise would not have been done that specialized testing revealed that the assistant was right
cyanide was present in Sue's bloodstream and a fatal amount of it doctors concluded that Sue ingested the poison
about 10 minutes before she died and here's a fascinating detail about the assistant suspecting the cyanide
poisoning in the first place based on that bitter almond smell that the other two doctors did not pick up on in
addition to the assistant having knowledge of it because of the death of her colleague there's also this research
shows that not just anyone can smell cyanide only people who who carry a specific Gene can detect any scent of
the poison approximately 20 to 40% of the population does not carry this Gene and therefore would not be able to smell
that bitter almond scent so the bottom line is it was incredibly lucky that the assistant picked up on this in the first
place otherwise Sous Snow's cause of death would have likely been ruled As Natural due to heart failure but now
investigators believed Sue was murdered they began exploring several different theories and persons of interests
including a past customer of Sue from the bank who she turned into authorities on suspicion of
embezzlement and then there was a chilling note that Sue got at the bank years ago that read quote to the whr of
the Puget Sound Bank the sender was never identified but all the leads eventually fizzled out except for one
now before we get into that here's some important context Sue was an identical twin she and her
twin sister Sarah were incredibly connected they shared just about everything including both having regular
headaches after Sue's funeral her twin Sarah went to grab the exin that she knew Sue always kept in her kitchen
cabinet but as soon as Sarah grabbed the bottle she noticed something was wrong inside there were capsules Sarah knew
that Sue never bought capsules she only bought tablets this was apparently because of the Chicago Tylenol murders
that took place four years earlier resulting in the deaths of seven people who had taken cyanide laced Tylenol
capsules the Tylenol murders left many people across the nation including twins Sarah and Sue terrified of taking
capsules tablets just appeared much safer as they're harder to tamper with so Sarah went to Sue's husband Paul with
her concern that it would be very unlike her sister to take capsules as reported
in the book bitter almonds by Greg Olen Sue's husband Paul told her twin Sarah that Sue had recently accidentally
bought the capsules but ultimately decided to keep taking them because she apparently thought they were much easier
to swallow but Sarah still felt uneasy about the whole thing and decided not to take any herself that day and this is a
part of the story I find a bit strange even though days after her death the exedran was still in the cabinet where
Sue always kept it and Sue's husband Paul brushed off comments from her twin that it seemed weird that Sue would take
capsules apparently Sue's husband Paul had already told investigators that he suspected the exedran may have killed
his wife essentially he was the first person to suggest that the exedran who took that morning may have been poisoned
and when the bottle of of 60 pills was examined investigators found there were 56 pills left inside testing concluded
that nine of those pills had cyanide in the capsule and then there was this Paul
explained that on the morning of Sue's death he took two pills from the brand new bottle of Excedrin before he left
for work before Sue had woken up presumably later that morning Sue then took her usual dose of two pills
and soon after died this would explain why four pills were missing from the bottle hearing this investigators
thought what are the odds that this brand new bottle was opened and Paul and Sue both took two pills from it a couple
hours apart and only one of them ended up dead and on top of that investigators found it was just a little too
convenient that Paul was the first person to suggest that the exedran could have been poisoned which of course
turned out to be correct and the more they dug the more suspicious they felt Paul looked their marriage was now under
a microscope and investigators found several things that frankly did not look good for Paul including a past Affair
investigators also apparently just felt his behavior was off to put it bluntly they didn't feel he was acting like a
grieving spouse should be but what really raised the alarm for them the most was his story that he took two of
the acedan pills the morning of his wife's death detectives theorized that Paul had poisoned the pills and then
threw out two of them so he could say that he took some himself thinking that that would make him look less suspicious
to investigators of course that did the exact opposite to investigators this appeared to be an all too familiar story
of a husband wanting to get rid of his wife story we've heard too many times but despite investigators strong belief
that Sue's death was an isolated incident the manufacturers of Excedrin a company named Bristol Meyers decided not
to take any chances and began a heavily publicized Nationwide recall this made Sous Snow's death a huge news story and
8 days after she had taken the poisonous pills investigators got a call that changed everything it came from a woman
who said her husband recently passed away and his death had strong similarities to what happened to sue
snow her husband's name was Bruce nickel who like s Snow lived in Auburn Washington 52-year-old Bruce and his
wife 43-year-old Stella lived a quiet life together they'd been married for 10 years after starting out their
relationship in the party scene the two had become homebodies over the years after Stella helped Bruce recover from
an alcohol addiction I they shared a quiet life together and often spent time at home tending to their saltwater
aquarium and their Garden Bruce died about a week before Sue on what initially appeared to be an ordinary day
Bruce came home from work where he greeted his wife and then took four etet capsules minutes later his wife called
911 and described her husband is being unconscious with difficulty breathing he was rushed to the hospital where he died
within hours Bruce's wife Stella reportedly found his autopsy report to be confusing and very upsetting when
doctors explained that they believed the 52-year-old's heart went out due to issues in his lungs Stella struggled to
accept that even though Bruce had been a longtime smoker she pointed out that before his death doctors didn't note him
having any health issues and he had recently passed a physical with flying colors Stella felt the pathologist
findings just couldn't be right soon after Sue Snow's death made national headlines and Stella nickel told police
the similarities between the two cases could not be ignored investigators collected the bottle of Excedrin that
Bruce had used the day he died the bottle was almost empty there were eight pills left Stella also gave them a
second unopened bottle of acedan Stella said that the two bottles were bought about 2 weeks apart at two different
supermarkets investigators found that of the remaining eight pills from the bottle Bruce had used two pills
contained Cyanide and the unopened bottle contained four lethal capsules Now by this point Bruce had already been
buried but fortunately the medical examiner's office kept a vial of his blood testing was performed that
confirmed that like Sous snow Bruce had been poisoned from there the media storm
was massive two strangers who died the same horrific death prompted a crippling fear Nationwide and it was disastrous
for the eedan brand both Sue Snow's husband and Bruce Nichols wife filed wrongful death suits against the company
Bristol Meyers who had already lost millions of dollars from the recall in total 15,000 bottles of exin were
collected during the recall and examined of which only one bottle contained any cyanide wased pills that bottle also
came from the same town where Sue and Bruce lived and then shortly after a manager at a local drugstore also in the
same town where Bruce and Sue lived called 911 to say they were suspicious about a bottle of Anison 3 pain
relievers that someone had misplaced in a random aisle upon testing the bottle had four poisonous pills inside now
investigators realized someone in Auburn Washington was poisoning multiple different brands of over-the-counter
pain relievers this prompted Washington State to put a 90-day ban on all over-the-counter medicine in capsule
form various drug companies also came together and offered a $300,000 reward for information on the
case meanwhile due to new laws enacted after the 1982 Chicago Tylenol murders the case became a federal matter and the
FBI began investigating they started digging into how someone was able to pull this off and concluded whoever
contaminated these five bottles definitely wore gloves and that the box that the pills were put inside had been
carefully opened along the seams and then put back together and then there's the safety seals which were implemented
as a result of the Chicago Tylenol murders everyone wanted to know how did someone get through the safety seal FBI
tchs concluded that if you were looking for it the naked eye could detect the seal had been cut but it wasn't so
obvious that someone would likely notice it if they weren't suspecting anything now upon examination of the poison
capsules forensics teams found that inside the Cy powder there appeared to be microscopic specks of green crystals
mixed in extensive testing was done and it appeared these green crystals were made up of chemicals meant to prevent
prent the growth of algae on a hunch an FBI chemist went to an aquarium store and found a product called algae
Destroyer which contained the mix of chemicals in the green crystals mixed in with the cyanide now this is where the
investigation turned up a notch back in Washington state special agents with the
FBI visited 57 local pet stores showing each employee photos of both of their victims Bruce and Sue and photos of
people close to them as asking if anyone in the photos had ever purchased this algae cleaner this may have seemed like
a long shot at first but one young employee at a pet store did recognize someone in those photos Stella Bruce
nicholl's wife and it's pretty incredible when you think about it just how lucky it is that this young man
remembered Stella based off of one interaction he had with one customer that he had no way of knowing would have
any significant ific an I find this detail fascinating essentially he said that Stell came into the store
complaining that the liquid algae cleaner she had recently bought for her saltwater aquarium was not working and
she wanted to use algae Destroyer tablets the pet store employee personally didn't think that algae
Destroyer tablets were a good product so the store didn't carry them but per Stella's request he ordered them
specially just for her and he remembered telling her her that the tablets were often very hard so she should crush them
up before using them so this memorable encounter coupled with the fact that police knew Stella had an aquarium at
home was pretty compelling their theory was that Stella had used the same Bowl to crush up the cyanide that she had
used to crush up her algae Destroyer blocks and the evidence continued to stack up against her investigators found
that Stella and Bruce had been in some serious debt and in the days before Bruce's death Stella sent a letter to
her debt collectors telling them she was late on her payments because she had been having issues in her marriage but
she said those issues were just about resolved and she added that her husband Bruce would no longer be involved a
friend of Stella's told police she remembered being with Stella when she bought multiple bottles of eedan shortly
before her husband Bruce's death and investigators found it odd that Stella had called out of work for a few days
before her husband's death presumably to work on putting her plan into motion but
there were still so many questions one of the biggest being why did Stella question her husband's autopsy remember
no one was ever questioning Bruce Nichols death or autopsy results except for Stella the medical examiner's office
felt it was a clear-cut case of his heart failing associated with with lung disease they attributed to years of him
being a smoker Stella would have been free to go on living her life with zero suspicion yet she was the one who called
police and insisted she thought her husband may have been poisoned the same way Sue snow had been which ultimately
led to the investigation that turned into her being the prime suspect so if she had been the killer why would she
ever do that well as it turned out authorities believed she had her reasons and as it often does it all boiled down
to money see Stella was the sole beneficiary of Bruce's $76,000 life insurance policy and that
policy had an additional payout of $100,000 if Bruce's death had been accidental but Stella wasn't going to
get that extra $100,000 because the insurance company noted that Bruce autopsy said he died
from natural causes as a consequence of a heart problem that stemmed from his smoking habit which if you can remember
Stella had fought that finding from the gecko and soon after Su Snow's death hit
the news Stella called the police and soon after she had a new death certificate for her husband that deemed
his death accidental in the eyes of the insurance company and Stella Got Her extra 100 ,000 furthermore FBI
handwriting analysts came to the conclusion that Bruce did not sign the documents for his own life insurance
they believe of course that Stella forged his signature and let's not forget that out of the 15,000 bottles of
Excedrin that were examined only four had cyanide laced pills and two of the four bottles were found inside Stella's
home which investigators felt was pretty damn but there were also issues with the case
as prosecutors still considered it to be very much circumstantial yes Stella had motive but
there was no physical evidence found in her home they had nothing they felt was concrete enough to make charges stick
and then the FBI got the call they had been waiting for though it came from an unexpected Source Stella's own daughter
Cynthia Stella had Cynthia long before she ever met Bruce Stella was just 15 when her daughter was born Cynthia and
her mom Stella had had a very Rocky up and down relationship pretty much Cynthia's entire life this part is
really sad as reported by journalist and author Greg Olen Cynthia found out as a
child that she was conceived when her mother Stella was raped as a young teenager and this Revelation put an
immense strain on their relationship but in 1986 Cynthia who was now an adult was
thankful that her mother Stella had helped her get a job at the Seattle Tacoma Airport where Stella worked
herself and it was there working together that Stella began to confide to her daughter about her and Bruce's
crippling debt and Cynthia says her mother then started mentioning topics like what's the easiest way to kill
someone and how would one go about hiring a Hitman she also then let it slip to her
daughter that her husband brw Bru was at the center of the murder for higher fantasies C Cynthia told detectives that
Stella wouldn't consider divorcing Bruce despite her being very vocal about feeling done with their marriage because
divorce would mean she'd lose half of everything she said she'd worked so hard to get and then Stella would fantasize
to Cynthia about what she would do with all that life insurance money she'd receive saying that one of her dreams
would to be to open up a tropical fish door but Stella's daughter would later tell detectives that she brushed off a
lot of this is just talk thinking that her mother wouldn't actually ever act on these thoughts I always think it's weird
when people say this but anyhow immediately after Bruce's death Cynthia said that her mom
confronted her and said something along the lines of I know what you're thinking
and the answer is no for Cynthia that coupled with the op autopsy ruling that Bruce died from natural causes Cynthia
said she felt reassured but I have to point out that after Cynthia learned that Bruce had been poisoned when she
was first questioned by detectives Cynthia still defended her mom but after Cynthia found out that her mom filled a
polygraph exam she said that was the push that she needed to accept that her mom was most likely involved and she
told detectives about her mom's comments that were made shortly before Bruce's death and yet reportedly detectives felt
they still didn't have enough they wanted something more concrete which led Cynthia to tell them about an alleged
failed plot to kill Bruce six months earlier Cynthia said that her mom had been spending a lot of time at the
library researching poisonous plants and she ended up growing a poisonous plant in her yard that she supposedly put into
capsules and gave to Bruce El Stella allegedly told her daughter that since Bruce was known to chew on wild grass
she felt his death would be open and shut and no one would question that Bruce could have chewed a plant growing
in his own yard not realizing it was poisonous but the poison from the plant didn't kill Bruce which Cynthia said was
very upsetting for her mom so while Cynthia's stories against her mom were getting more and more damning it all
still fell in that circumstantial evidence category but the mentions of Stella doing research at the library
gave the feds a new lead and sure enough they found that Stella had checked out several books about various poisons
during the time frame in question the final nail in Stella's coffin was yet another admission from her daughter
Cynthia about a conversation they had had where Cynthia said her mom talked about how easy it would be to rep
replicate the Chicago Tylenol murders and then Cynthia said days before Bruce's death she saw capsules and a
container of white powder in her mom's Locker at work so investigators at this point finally felt they had enough
evidence against Stella for the murder of her husband but they were still wondering how did Sue snow a woman she
and her husband had never met fit into all of this why did Sue snow have to die ultimately investigators formed the
theory that Stella assumed her husband's autopsy would reveal that he was poisoned it really threw a wrench in her
plan when the pathologist missed that part and quickly closed the case as a natural death without the pathologist
finding the poison Stella wasn't going to get that additional $100,000 payout for a death considered accidental by the
life insurance company but investigators believed that Stella thought it would be
too too risky to flat out demand that Bruce's death be re-examined that that could make her look
suspicious so instead investigators theorized that Stella wanted to make it look like there was a pharmaceutical
terrorist out there so she put a poison bottle of acetan back on the Shelf in a nearby drugstore and waited Su snow
bought that planted bottle and soon afterwards she consumed the poisonous capsules and died which gave Stella her
Inn to ask investigators that Bruce's death be re-examined which resulted in his death certificate being changed and
her getting that payout now I want to take a moment to go back to the early days of the susn murder investigation
when seemingly everyone was convinced that Sue's husband Paul was her killer not only did detectives come to believe
that he did it Sue's family did as well and it destroyed a lot of relationships that were likely irreparable I think
there's something really interesting about looking at something that looks so suspicious that can then turn out to be
completely innocent like Sue's husband Paul telling her twin sister that despite Sue having this longtime fear of
taking capsules shortly before her death she apparently accidentally bought them
and then decided she liked them at that time coupled with Paul saying he also took acetan from from the same bottle
the day of Sue's death really did not look good for him in the eyes of investigators or really anyone but in
the end it was all true and furthermore what's terrifying about this case is if you remember it was incredibly lucky
that the cyanide was detected during Su Snow's autopsy had it not been for the assistant there that had the past
experience with knowing what cyani smelled like and had she also not had the gene necessary to smell it in the
first place Sous Snow's death would have been presumed to be due to heart failure
and then who knows how many more deaths there would have been so in 1988 Stella went on trial and was ultimately
convicted of five counts of product tampering resulting in the death of her husband Bruce nickel and Sue snow Stella
nickel was sentenced to 90 years in prison now just a little tidbit here that I think is interesting about this
case a lot of inmates in Washington state who were originally given really lengthy sentences for homicide cases in
the 70s and 80s including cases where there were numerous victims a lot of those inmates have been released so I
thought there was a pretty good chance that Stella nickel had been released but she hasn't and the big difference
between Stella's case and these other Washington State cases is Stella's case is federal so the things we're seeing in
state cases here in Washington don't apply to her in fact in 2022 Stella filed a petition asking for
something called compassionate release Stella was 78 years old at the time and she said her failing Health wasn't being
treated adequately in the federal prison Stella mentioned in the petition how she
has been a model inmate over the last 34 years but her request was denied in Fall
2023 thank you so much for watching and don't forget if you want hear the original case File episode which
includes much more detail you can find that wherever you get your podcasts and here on our YouTube channel case 93
Susan snow and Bruce nickel if you enjoyed this video please be sure to give it a thumbs up and subscribe to our
Channel thank you

Casefile partnered with Olivia LaVoice, the host of the Bakersfield Three podcast, to bring you a new video series, ‘Olivia Presents’ The idea is to create YouTube videos in which Olivia takes our most popular Casefile episodes and presents them in a more 'YouTube' format, with additional photos, videos, graphics and even new info.

This is the first one.

When 40-year-old bank manager Susan Snow collapsed in her shower after complaining of a headache, the cause of her sudden death wasn’t clear. In a bid for answers, an autopsy was conducted, during which the medical examiner notices a distinct smell that immediately alerts her to the possibility that Susan was poisoned.

A week earlier, 52-year-old Bruce Nickell passed away suddenly from what was thought to be natural causes. When word gets out about Susan’s death, Bruce’s wife Stella Nickell comes forward to report her suspicions that her husband could have fallen victim to a similar fate.

Based on Case 93: Susan Snow & Bruce Nickell https://casefilepodcast.com/case-93-susan-snow-and-bruce-nickell/

CREDITS

Narration – Anonymous Host Research and writing – Milly Raso Production, scoring – Mike Migas Additional scoring – Andrew Joslyn

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Brief Summary

Susan Snow and Bruce Nicholl were poisoned with cyanide in Excedrin, leading to a chilling investigation that revealed Stella Nicholl's deceit and motive.

Key points

The Mysterious Death of Sue Snow. Sue Snow's seemingly routine life takes a dark turn when she dies unexpectedly, leading to a shocking investigation.
Unraveling the Connection. Investigators discover a chilling similarity between Sue Snow's death and that of Bruce Nicholl.
Stella's Dark Secrets. Stella Nicholl's financial troubles and troubling conversations with her daughter raise suspicions.
The Poisonous Plot Unfolds. Cynthia reveals her mother's chilling research into poisonous plants before Bruce's death.
Stella's Dark Plan. Stella Nickel allegedly researched poisons and attempted to kill her husband for insurance money.
Trial and Conviction. Stella Nickel was convicted of product tampering resulting in death and sentenced to 90 years.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

There's something especially terrifying thinking about one of those routine things resulting in death.

Introduction to the chilling story.

0:13WatchMay 29, 2024

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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