A Gold Digger Preys on a Lonely Guy
(“Muddy Waters,” Forensic Files)
Janice Dodson sneaked into a hunter’s camp, stole one of his guns, and shot her husband to death with it, then slipped away unseen.
It was a crafty plot to collect nearly half a million dollars in insurance payouts while deflecting suspicion away from herself.
But once it looked as though her plan was working, she knocked off the grieving-widow act way too soon.
Relentless greed. According to “Muddy Waters,” the Forensic Files episode about the Bruce Dodson homicide, on the day after the murder, Janice took Bruce’s name off the couple’s mailbox, got rid of his things, and (worst of all) had his dog put to sleep.
In addition to being a murderer, framer, and fraudster, Janice Dodson had serious trouble delaying gratification and was an enemy to dogs everywhere.
For this week, I looked around for an update on her.
But first, here’s a recap of the episode, along with extra information drawn from internet research as well as the mass-market paperback Dead Center by Frank J. Daniels, the lawyer who prosecuted her:
At long last love. John Bruce Dodson, known as Bruce, worked as a medical technologist at Delta Memorial County Hospital in Delta, Colorado. He was also a Navy veteran and a University of Maryland graduate.
The longtime bachelor was crazy about his new wife, Janice Dodson, a divorced registered nurse he met at work. Janice, who pronounces her name “juhn-eese,” liked to hunt game and wanted to interest him in the sport, too.
In fact, she was such an avid outdoorswoman that she wore a headdress shaped like a hunting hat, covered in lace and tulle, for her wedding.
I’ve seen a lot of regrettable bridal hat-veils, but Janice Dodson’s get-up deserved an “I object” more than any of them.
An actress, too. But back to the crime that’s actually illegal: On October 15, 1995, a hunter and Texas lawman identified as Doug Kyle on Forensic Files (the book gave his name as Brent Branchwater) found Janice leaning over the body of her 48-year-old husband. Bruce Dodson was bleeding from gunshot wounds, and his heartbroken spouse was screaming hysterically in shock and despair.
Janice made a good show of being loving. She placed Bruce’s vest and her sweatshirt over the body, wiped the dirt from his face, and straightened his glasses, Daniels details in his book.
At some point during the drama, she fainted convincingly enough that a helicopter was summoned to fly her to the hospital, according to book.
Different game. She told police that she went out looking for Bruce when he didn’t return to their hunting camp near Brushy Ridge Trail on western Colorado’s Uncompahgre Plateau. She found him wounded on the ground.
They had been hunting separately; she was looking for elk and he was hoping for a deer.
Medical examiner Tom Canfield, who already knew the victim from his work at the hospital, determined he had three bullet wounds, too many to call it a hunting accident.
Police found a 308-caliber Nosling shell casing near the murder scene.
Former spouse suspected. Janice’s ex-husband, J.C. Lee, had been camping nearby the Dodsons. He told police his 308-caliber rifle and some of his Nosling shells were stolen from his tent the night before Bruce’s shooting.
Police learned that J.C. Lee and Janice Dodson had ended their 25-year marriage when he started dating their daughter’s best friend.
Police wondered whether Lee resented that Janice had moved on with another man.
Counting her money. Citing the unreliability of polygraph tests, Lee refused to take one, but he had a solid alibi. His girlfriend and a coworker vouched for the fact that he was hunting with them at the time of the murder.
Investigators soon turned their attention to the grieving widow from Cedaredge, Colorado. It turned out that she had purchased three insurance policies totaling $464,000 on her husband shortly before his death.
She may have wanted the money to pay off debts that piled up during her divorce, according to a Montrose Daily Press story dated November 23, 1998.
Mired in trouble. Investigators also discovered that while she was supposed to be visiting relatives in Texas to mourn Bruce’s death, Janice was actually gambling at a Louisiana casino called the Players Club.
No word on whether she won or lost on her wagers that night, but investigators started having good luck with the forensics.
A NecroSearch International volunteer who helped search for the missing gun noticed an artificial pond lined with bentonite clay in the area where J.C. Lee had been camping.
Lurking in the distance. The mud that stained Janice’s clothing the day of the murder matched the bentonite clay from the pond — which placed her in Lee’s camp, where the gun first disappeared.
Investigators believed that she waded through the mud to sneak into Lee’s campsite and pilfer his Remington 308-caliber rifle and some of his ammunition.
The next day, she went hunting alone.
Investigators theorized that Janice found a hiding place and shot at Bruce at long range with the stolen gun. After the first bullet grazed Bruce, he thought a hunter had mistaken him for a deer, so he took off his orange hunting vest and waved it in the air, they believed.
Diabolique. Then Janice put two more bullets in him and disposed of the stolen gun, which the police never found.
Prosecutors suspect that Janice had planned to kill Bruce Dodson from the very start of their relationship — and conveniently pin the murder on her ex-husband, J.C Lee (the book gives his name as Mark Gordon Morgan).
It took three years to string the case together with ballistic evidence. In the meantime, Janice Dodson forgot about Bruce and started over. (As if throwing out his possessions weren’t enough of an insult, she allegedly dumped his ashes on the side of the road.)
Liquidating like crazy. She relocated to Nocogdoches, Texas, and married Bartlett M. Hall in Las Vegas on November 27, 1996. He took out $100,000 in life insurance to make sure his bride would be taken care of should anything happen to him, according to Forensic Files.
Fortunately, by the time the police arrested Janice in October 1998, no unlucky accidents had befallen Hall.
Maybe she still had enough money left over from pillaging Bruce Dodson’s assets. She had sucked the money from his IRAs, sold his horse, Glory, and put one of his two properties up for sale — he owned them before they met, but she persuaded him to put her name on the titles during their three-month marriage.
Her take. A jury found Janice Dodson guilty of first-degree murder after deliberating for three and a half days. On March 20, 2000, she received a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
The crime website Murderpedia has reproduced some hard-to-find stories about the case, including an ABC article with the following statement Janice Dodson made to Prime Time interviewer Chris Cuomo after the trial:
I still do [love Bruce Dodson],” Janice said. “The only way I can live with this, is that I have the peace of knowing I didn’t do it, and the prayer in my heart that some day the truth will win out.”
In a 2002, a three-judge Colorado Court of Appeals panel rejected her lawyers’ claim that Janice’s jury didn’t receive clear instructions.
Behind razor wire. Today, Janice is inmate #104430 at the Denver Women’s Correctional Facility in Mesa County. Her profile still lists her sentence as life without parole.
It also notes that she stands 5-foot-8-inches and weighs in at 150 pounds — trim by prison standards. Facilities tend to serve heavy foods that bulk up the inmates.
The prison participates in programs allowing inmates to help train troubled and neglected dogs to become service animals for army veterans, but it’s doubtful that any animal would trust the likes of her.
The insurance jackpot she hoped to collect ended up going to Bruce Dodson’s brother, Michael C. Dodson, and sister, Martha E. Asberry.
Their mother, Ruth E. Dodson, lived until 2002, long enough to see her ex-daughter-in-law put away for good, where she can’t hurt anyone else’s son.
That’s all for this post. Until next time, cheers. — RR
Watch the Forensic Files episode on YouTube or Amazon Prime
