The Bodies That Weren't There For Three Months - Episode 54

She Bought a New Purse That Afternoon: The Murder of Jane Newman

Jane Newman stopped at a store on her way home from work to exchange a purse. That purse was found next to her body less than two hours later. The official investigation closed inside of three months — but the man who burned the only suicide note and threw the shotgun off a highway bridge was never charged with murder.

In this episode, we explore a fishing line threaded through a hole in a laundry room wall, a one-hundred-thousand-dollar life insurance policy whose suicide exclusion expired exactly four days before Jane died, and a computerized phone system her husband programmed himself that may have built his alibi call by call. Was this a woman who planned her own death with military precision — or a crime scene staged by someone who knew exactly which evidence would never be tested?

Case Details

Victim: Jane Newman, 30, mortgage company employee.

Date: November 22, 1993.

Location: St. Croix County, Wisconsin, USA.

Case Status: The case is an open homicide. A 1997 civil jury found James Newman responsible for Jane's murder and ordered over four hundred thousand dollars in damages, upheld on appeal in 2001. No criminal homicide charges have ever been filed.

Episode Key Points

- The suicide exclusion on Jane's one-hundred-thousand-dollar life insurance policy expired exactly four days before her death — a fact her husband claimed not to know.

- Jim Newman burned the alleged suicide note, flushed the ashes, wrapped the shotgun in garbage bags, drove three miles, and threw it from a bridge — all before calling 911.

- Bubble wrap fragments found inside Jane's gunshot wound matched computer packaging material from Jim's employer, where he had direct daily access.

- Jim's employer testified that Jim had personally programmed the company's computerized telemarketing system and could have used it to generate the home calls that formed his alibi.

Jane Newman, St. Croix County Wisconsin homicide, murder 1993, open homicide Wisconsin, civil trial wrongful death, true crime, homicide, investigation, forensic science, murder, criminal minds, unsolved mysteries, true crime English.