Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Police seek phone records of 2 in woman's slaying

Pierson called man on Dec. 27, his sister says

By CHRIS A. COUROGEN

At least two people are being looked at by police who are investigating the homicide of Perry County resident Elaine Pierson.

State police have obtained search warrants for the cell phone records of Antonio M. Mercede II, 46, of the 400 block of Woodcrest Drive, Hampden Twp.

Probable-cause documents for the warrant state, "Interviews conducted during the investigation have called Mercede's credibility into question."

Investigators also obtained search warrants for the phone records of Rochelle Laudenslager, 45, the Lower Paxton Twp. woman whose home, vehicles and office have been searched.

Court documents supporting the warrant request for Laudenslager's phone records had similar language about credibility questions.

State police refused to comment on Mercede or the warrant and continued to say no person has been classified as a suspect in Pierson's death.

Pierson, 48, of Rye Twp., was reported missing Dec. 29. Friends found her body during a Jan. 6 search off Idle Road near Lambs Gap Road on the Perry County side of Blue Mountain.

Laudenslager and Mercede had connections to Pierson.

Laudenslager's mother had said her daughter was involved in a relationship with Pierson about four years ago and had lived with her.

Laudenslager, the director of western regional professional services for Highmark Inc., was with the group that found Pierson's body.

Reached on his cell phone yesterday, Mercede refused to comment on the warrants or to answer questions about Pierson.

In response to an earlier request for an interview, Mercede's sister, Marianne Cowden, said her brother did not want to talk about Pierson at the time because he was upset about her death.

Cowden said Mercede and Pierson were friends and said Mercede was the person believed to have spoken to Pierson in her last known conversation.

Pierson initiated that phone call the night of Dec. 27, Cowden said.

Mercede returned to Pennsylvania last year after cancer surgery in North Carolina and reconnected with Pierson, who played on a softball team that Mercede coached before he moved south, Cowden said.

Laudenslager's lawyer, George Matangos of Lemoyne, said he was aware of phone calls between his client and Pierson, which he said were "congenial, mutual" contacts between two people who enjoyed a friendly relationship.

"It's perfectly natural to get cell phone records of people who spoke to Elaine around the time of her death," Matangos said.

Records say that state police obtained warrants to look at Pierson's cell phone and financial records on Jan. 3, the first of two days of police-organized searches for Pierson.

At that time, investigators were publicly calling the disappearance suspicious, but the warrants state that they were looking at the case as a homicide.

"Elaine may be the victim of criminal homicide," say documents submitted by police with their request to obtain Pierson's financial records. Those documents also paint a possible scenario of her death.

The "lack of evidence suggests Elaine may have known the attacker and was not surprised or did not engage the attacker in a violent struggle," the warrant documents state.

"Often, criminal homicide victims have some relationship or have known their attackers prior to the crime."

CHRIS A. COUROGEN: 255-8112 or ccourogen@patriot-news.com

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