How a slasher movie spawned real-life horror

Blaine Norris seemed determined to finish his masterpiece in the spring of 2003, even though friends say he was starting to act skittish. Actor Sean Gaston remembers visiting Norris’ Harrisburg apartment months after the murder to help edit the unfinished film called “Through Hike”.

Sean Gaston, actor: He said that the police were questioning him as a friend of Brian and they found it strange that he directed a horror film. And I said something like, “If the police are looking at you just on the sheer fact that you directed a horror film... then tell me why Hollywood horror directors are not locked up?”

And someone else, Norris’ drinking buddy Dan Bartash could see his pal starting to sweat. He remembers meeting him in this bar one day.  Norris had just turned over a sample of his blood to authorities at a clinic.

Dan Bartash, Blaine Norris' friend: He said that he had followed the truck that was carrying his blood. He had followed the truck and he had wanted to run it off the road.  And I said, “But Blaine, that truck should have been your salvation. You know, it doesn’t make any sense.”

Norris’ salvation because that blood sample could have ruled him out as a suspect.  What Bartash didn’t know was that his friend had reason to be scared.  As it turns out Norris knew all about blood samples—and crime scenes.  As detectives executed search warrants on Norris’ apartment, they found a collection of technical books on forensics. 

Chip Dougherty, police detective: We found a forensic book where he had had actually highlighted things about how you could hide forensics or what made you should look for in forensics.

Police also found something else: a cache of handguns, rifles, and hunting knives— though not the one that killed Randi Trimble. 

They even discovered a copy of the movie “Murder by Numbers” starring Sandra Bullock. It’s a story about two young men who kill for the thrill of it and try to leave no trace of their crime behind. But it was in Norris’ car that police found the most compelling item of all: a small receipt from a K-Mart in nearby Lancaster, Pa. Det. Dougherty later matched the receipt to a box of plastic surgical gloves, work gloves, a hooded sweatshirt and pants.

Then Dougherty asked the store manager if anything else had been bought that day on the same credit card.

Det. Dougherty: He said, “Oh, he bought a 6-inch filet knife.” I almost fell over.  I mean that’s what was used. The knife that the forensic pathologist believed to be at least six inches in length, and, sure enough, that’s what it was.

Yet in all their searches, police never found the actual murder weapon. There was one more problem: Blaine Norris’ alibi. His buddy Dan Bartash told police that he and another friend had seen Norris the night of the murder between 7:15 and 7:30 outside Norris’ apartment, just at the moment Randi Trimble’s killer was waiting to murder her.

Bartash: We stopped and talked to him for a few minutes. And then he was heading off to York and we you know said good bye and he went off to York and we went off to Philadelphia.

That goodbye recollected by the friend had to have happened at the very moment Randi Trimble’s killer was poised to murder her. In other words, Blaine Norris couldn’t have committed the crime.

Or could he? Bartash, Norris’s buddy, told police that moments after he and his friend left the amateur movie maker, they stopped for gas.  

Video surveillance shows Bartash’s friend entering the service station that night. After analyzing the tape police realized Bartash had gotten his times mixed-up. He was an hour off.

Det. Dougherty: And sure enough he had purchased gas there on the night of the tenth—around 8:30 — not 7:30.

Murphy: Quite different

Det. Dougherty: Tracking that back 15 minutes, he now sees Blaine coming down his from his apartment at 8:15 not 7:15. Plenty of time, he’d already been back.

His alibi went up in smoke. Police and the district attorney finally believed they had what they needed to arrest Norris at his apartment.

Det. Dougherty: He opened the door and saw us standing there. And both of us were excited to be the first one to say “You’re under arrest.” He turned pale white. He almost blended in with the white refrigerator and almost fainted, just keeled right over on the floor.

Blaine Norris was charged with first degree murder in the death of Randi Trimble.  Now, the confident young director could be facing a different kind of horror— the death penalty.  But Norris wasn’t giving anything up. He insisted he was innocent. Detectives were confident they could prove their case in court. But Norris would have one more surprise for them.

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