According to Maine State Police Allen Jamison’s Fire Marshal Report, Shuman left the scene at 4:52. And at 5:45 p.m. he had Mike’s girlfriend at the Bangor PD where he and Bangor Police Detective Lt. Roger Bryce took the above statement from her. It is in Shuman's words of what he claims Linda said.
What caused Shuman to visit Mike’s girlfriend within less than one hour after leaving the murder scene if they had no reports of anyone missing?
An article in the BDN on 26th of February 1981 reported Shuman as saying, “The Bangor Police Department suggested Cochran as the possible identity of the corpse.” [A document in Johnson’s discovery shows that DA Cox reported to the County Sheriff that Mike was deceased and to close his case while the medical examiner was still at the murder scene].
After Linda left the Bangor PD, she tried to reach me. I was not at home. She called my sister in Massachusetts trying to find me. My sister didn't know where I was but knew there was something wrong and asked Linda if there was something wrong. Linda told her that Mike was dead and that the police had just told her that men from Massachusetts went to the cottage, knocked Mike unconscious, and then set the cottage on fire. This information is not in Shuman's statement. And after I learned this neither Shuman nor Linda would ever confirm it.
After receiving Linda's statements I wondered why Shuman and Bryce went home and went to bed and never contacted Mike’s parents. I contacted the Maine State Police in March when I was told Mike's death wasn't an accident that he was murdered.
In Linda's statement it says that she told Shuman that she was visiting Mike every day and since Monday, the 16th [The 16th was one day before Mike was murdered.], there had been another person staying at the Dupray camp whom she later identified as Paul Pollard.
Why would Linda not tell the detectives Pollard’s name on the 24th? Why later? How long did Linda withhold Pollard’s name from the Maine State Police? The statement is in Shuman’s words of what he claims Linda told him—very easy to manipulate in my belief. I believe Shuman is the one who is not identifying Pollard. Bryce had already arrested Pollard at the Bangor PD for forgery, six hours before he and Shuman took a statement from Linda.
Linda advised that on the evening of February 17, 1981 she went to visit Micheal at about 1800 hours and left the cottage after midnight.
Present at this time at the camp were Percy Sargent, Paul Pollard, and Micheal Cochran and herself. Percy left the camp, she thinks at about 2230 hours [for drug deal], the other short guy stayed on the couch through most of the evening, they never did engage in any type of conversation. ... The last time she saw Micheal Cochran was sometime after midnight of the 17th [Mike was murdered between 3 to 4 hours after Linda left the cottage]. She said good night to him at the door and she thought that he went upstairs to sleep in the loft and she thought the other guy was still on the couch. She heard (who told her?) about the camp catching fire, she went down the following day [six days before Mike was found, yet she didn’t contact Mike's family or the authorities.] and saw in fact that the camp had burned down, but she had no idea where Micheal was. ...
According to this statement, Linda was not asked if she had any idea who or why anyone would kill Mike. We know that the other guy on the couch when she left the cottage after midnight was Paul Pollard. This contradicts Pollard's 3-3-1981 statement of sleeping in the back room (there was only one bedroom in the cottage and it was Percy's room.) on a lawn chair and Assistant AG Tom Goodwin story of Pollard sleeping in a back room.
Linda told the law officials that Mike had a scar between his throat and breast plate as the result of an operation. The scar was at the base of his neck. But it was erroneously reported as being on his chest.
In the following photo the top part of a couch Pollard was sleeping on can be seen directly under the stairs leading to the loft where Mike was sleeping. Linda says twice in her statement that Paul Pollard was on the couch.
