Cassidy Rainwater case: Sheriff waits for lab results before ‘possible other charges’
It could be several weeks before more information is released in the case of Cassidy Rainwater, the Missouri woman who was allegedly kidnapped in the Ozarks and held in a cage.
Dallas County Sheriff Scott Rice told The Star Wednesday afternoon that he was told that it could be 30 to 90 days before forensic tests come back.
“We’re waiting for lab results to pursue possible other charges,” said Rice, whose department is leading the investigation.
For weeks, few details about the case have been shared with the public. Even now, Rice said, there’s little he can divulge.
The only facts that have been available come from court records explaining the kidnapping charges filed against two men — James D. Phelps, 58, and Timothy L. Norton, 56. The records say Phelps had seven photos of Rainwater on his cellphone that showed her partially nude body inside the cage in the small, rundown home where he was living near Windyville, about 160 miles southeast of Kansas City.
“We’re trying to protect the integrity of the case and make sure that we have a good and just trial,” Rice said. “We don’t want to taint any possible jurors with, you know, the facts of the case getting out before they should get out.”
A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Nov. 5 in Dallas County Circuit Court. Both suspects are being held without bond — Phelps in the Dallas County Jail and Norton in the Greene County Jail.
The sheriff said the swirling rumors — some of them making social media headlines across the country — are “very frustrating” for him and his deputies to deal with.
“It makes it hard to do your job really, with all the false rumors going around and all this speculation,” Rice said. “When you try to talk to someone, that’s all they want to talk about, ‘Well, I heard this and I heard that.’ We can’t go off of hearsay.
“We’ve chased a lot of rabbits down rabbit holes that ended up nowhere because of that. … You’ve spent a lot of man hours and time chasing a rumor that somebody just made up or thought they heard.”
Rainwater, 33, was officially reported missing in late August. A deputy assigned to follow up on the incident learned that Phelps reportedly was the last one to see her.
The deputy said Phelps told him Rainwater had been staying there “until she could get back on her feet,” according to the probable cause statement related to the charges filed against Phelps. “James (Phelps) told me she was talking about going to Colorado.”
Phelps also told the deputy that at the end of July, Rainwater had left in the middle of the night and met with a vehicle at the end of the driveway and he had not seen or heard from her since.
In mid-September, the Kansas City office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation received an anonymous tip with photos, including one of Rainwater inside the cage. That tip led the FBI to Dallas County and launched what has become a secretive, weeks-long criminal investigation.
Phelps and Norton were charged last month with kidnapping Rainwater and facilitating a felony, inflicting injury and terrorizing. Authorities haven’t said anything about Rainwater’s whereabouts. Officially, she is still reported as missing.
At the beginning of the investigation, Rice said Wednesday, the sheriff’s department kept custody of the crime scene at 386 Moon Valley Road for 24 hours a day for seven days straight.
“That means I’ve got to leave manpower there all the time to keep it secure,” Rice said. “There was at least a deputy there all the time.”
After investigators completed their work at the scene, it was released back to the homeowner, who had rented the house to Phelps.
The mystery surrounding the case intensified when the home burned to the ground on Oct. 4. First responders discovered what appeared to be a makeshift tripwire and called in the Springfield Fire Department’s Bomb Squad.
Fire investigators found evidence of two incendiary devices, according to an initial report released this week by the Springfield Fire Department.
“When officers got on scene, they found (an) incendiary device in a mortar tube with a balloon cover … and trip wire attached,” the report said.
Rice said he does not think the property was booby trapped: “I don’t think that was the intention.”
The Missouri Division of Fire Safety is conducting an investigation into the cause and origin of the fire, a spokesman told The Star on Wednesday.
“The report will be sent to the requesting agency — the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office — once it’s completed, and because it’s an ongoing investigation, it’s not going to be open,” said Mike O’Connell, communications director for the Missouri Department of Public Safety.
Any information regarding the results of that investigation must come from the Sheriff’s Office, O’Connell said.
Online records show the house on the heavily wooded property has been owned by a southwest Missouri man since 2009. The most current assessment documents put the total market value of the 3-acre property at $24,900. The house is described as being built in 1996 and having 800 square feet of living area.
Rice said he took to social media last week to dispel rumors after he began to hear people speculate that remains of up to 18 people were found on the property.
“That’s not true,” Rice said Wednesday. “That’s getting to be a way far-fetched story there.”
And rumors like that could impact families of missing people.
“People that are missing their loved ones and they think, ‘Maybe they are there.’ And that’s just not the case.”
This story was originally published October 13, 2021 at 5:43 PM.
