The tips are still coming in.
A year after one of the most high-profile homicides in recent Greene County history, Sheriff Jim Arnott said his investigators are still learning about the life and death of Clauddinnea "Dee Dee" Blanchard.
"It is the case that never seems to stop," Arnott said. "There's always new information because it was so bizarre."
On June 14, 2015, Greene County deputies were called out to a home at 2103 W. Volunteer Way.
Blanchard, the friendly Cajun woman who lived there with her daughter, hadn't been seen for a couple of days. And when a disturbing post appeared on her Facebook page stating, "That B---- is dead," friends feared the worst.
Greene County deputies say they got a warrant, entered the home and found Blanchard, 48, stabbed to death.
Blanchard's daughter, Gypsy Blanchard, who was thought to suffer from leukemia and muscular dystrophy was gone — and her wheelchair had been left behind.
The sheriff's office moved quickly and asked for the public's help finding the missing daughter.
It wasn't long, however, before investigators learned there was a lot more going on inside the pink home with the blacked out windows just north of the Springfield city limits.
By June 16, 2015, Gypsy Blanchard, 24, had been arrested in Wisconsin with her boyfriend Nicholas Godejohn, 27, and the pair had been charged with first-degree murder.
Photos: Blanchard case
Gypsy Blanchard, who can walk just fine, allegedly arranged for Godejohn — the boyfriend she chatted with on a Christian dating website — to come to Springfield and kill her mother. Deputies say the couple then took more than $4,400 from the mother's safe and fled to Godejohn's home in Wisconsin.
Over the next few days the story kept developing with family members saying Dee Dee Blanchard imprisoned her daughter and forced her to pretend she was disabled.
The sheriff also said the mother and daughter, who were thought to be Hurricane Katrina survivors, were running a long financial fraud scheme. The women apparently duped everyone from the sheriff's office (which investigated concerns about Gypsy Blanchard's health five years prior) to organizations like Habitat for Humanity (which supplied the Blanchards with their home on Volunteer Way).
As the bizarre story unraveled, some of the country's most prominent news outlets made calls to Arnott's office.
"It's kind of what movies are made of, that very twisted information that you don't see it coming around the corner," Arnott said. "When the information came in, you were like, 'How is that possible?'"
As Gypsy Blanchard and Godejohn's case has moved through the judicial system over the past year, some new information has come out.
Prosecutors presented text messages between Godejohn and Gypsy Blanchard before the homicide in which they said things like, "Honey, you forget I am ruthless, and my hatred of her will force her to die." And, "We will be happy soon. After this night, we will never bring it up."
Defense attorneys, meanwhile, said Dee Dee Blanchard had so much control over her daughter's life that it took Gypsy Blanchard several months to gain access to her own medical records.
Despite all that has been written about the case, Arnott said there's much more to the plot that won't be publicized until the trial begins in late November.
"It's got some weird twists and turns," Arnott said. "That is what is going to be interesting when it comes out to the community. As the trial goes on, a lot of those things will be revealed."
As information came out about Gypsy Blanchard's health and the claims made by relatives, many people following the case online speculated that the woman might have been a victim of Munchausen by proxy — a form of abuse that involves a parent exaggerating, inducing or making up illnesses for a child.
One of Gypsy Blanchard's attorneys told the News-Leader in April that the attorneys are looking at all possible defenses, including Munchausen by proxy.
Photos: Gypsy Blanchard arraignment
Arnott said he worked two Munchausen by proxy cases when he was a child abuse investigator, so he is familiar with the symptoms and behavior.
Arnott said Munchausen by proxy will likely come up at trial. Arnott said it is not up to him to decide if that is a viable offense.
"I am familiar with it, there are some things that I think you will see in this case and you will think 'anything's a possibility,'" Arnott said. "But I also think you will see some things that are just the total opposite of that."
One advantage the sheriff's office has now, Arnott said, is they get to monitor Gypsy Blanchard's health every day while she stays in the county jail.
Arnott said the challenge for his investigators now is to uncover enough of the Blanchard fraud scheme so that jury members won't have any unanswered questions, without spending too much time chasing leads that don't have anything to do with June 2015. The entire scope of the fraud, he said, will likely always be a mystery.
"We don't want to run down rabbit trails because we have to focus on what the situation is here," Arnott said. "The situation is a murder, and the information surrounding the murder. A lot of that other information doesn't really matter."
Arnott said there is a lot of electronic evidence that is still being processed, and detectives are continuing to learn new things about the case.
"I think this is a case that will be ongoing right up until the trial starts," Arnott said.
