Dale Warner: Preliminary Exam Day 3

Dee Ann Warner and Stephanie Voelkle. Photo courtesy of Stephanie Voelkle.

Yesterday was the third day of Dale Warner’s preliminary exam to determine whether the Lenawee County prosecutor has enough evidence to proceed to a murder trial. Dale was charged with the murder of his wife, Dee Ann Warner, and tampering with evidence in November 2023. Dee was reported missing by her adult children on April 25, 2021. She was last seen at her home in Tipton, Michigan.

The first to take the stand was Georgia Ziegler, Michigan State Police Mapping Analyst, who analyzed the data from Dee’s cellphone. The last voice activity on that phone was an outgoing call at 4:47 PM on April 24, 2021. The last data connection, which is anything that requires the internet, was at 7:14 AM on April 25, 2021. By using two towers near the Warner’s home in Tipton, Michigan, they were able to ping it to the Warner’s Munger Road property.

Stacey Brodie, Dee’s massage therapist, testified their professional relationship turned into a friendship. Dee received weekly massages to alleviate chronic pain. Stacey described two instances where she saw bruises on Dee that were cause for concern. One time, Dee had a bruise on her right hip the size of an orange. “It was a greenish-bluish color,” Stacey said. Dee explained it by saying she and Dale had fought and he pushed her into a dresser. Another time, there was a large bruise on her thigh. Dee told Stacey she and Dale had been arguing.

Five days before Dee vanished, Stacey heard Dee’s last words to her. “She said she was tired and that it was time to talk to a lawyer,” Stacey said.

When asked to describe Dee, Stacey said, “She was as fierce as a lion with the heart of a lamb.”

Stephanie Voelkle was Dee’s friend and worked at Dee’s trucking company as an assistant for five years. Stephanie described an instance when Dee came to the office toward the end of 2020 with a goose egg on her forehead. It was the “size of a quarter.”

Stephanie testified Dee had shown her the tracking device a mechanic found under her vehicle. She said in early 2021, Dee asked her to research getting her a second phone to use in case of emergencies. It was in preparation for a trip to Florida in March with Dale and their daughter. Stephanie researched phones but never purchased one for Dee.

Stephanie and Dee communicated almost daily in person, through calls, or texts. About a year before Dee disappeared, they started using Snapchat. For those unfamiliar, Snapchat is an app that allows users to have conversations that delete by default.

Nikole Anderson, Michigan State Police Criminal Intelligence Analyst, testified she used multiple data bases to find pattern of life activity for Dee. These data bases check for things like facial recognition, driving infractions, law enforcement interaction, warrants, the buying or selling of property, insurance claims, and crossing U.S. borders. There has been no sign of Dee since her disappearance.

Detective Sgt. Drewyor, Michigan State Police was the last to take the stand. He had assisted in the case prior to the Lenawee County Sheriff’s Office handing over Dee’s case to Michigan State Police in August 2022. When Drewyor was assisting LCSO in the Spring of 2022, they procured a search warrant for Dale and Dee’s Munger Road home and all the outbuildings on that property including vehicles. The primary reason for the search warrant was electronic devices.

“We seized devices that we now know were her previous devices, so maybe phones she had in years past. I came in contact with a phone that had her data on it, that she never possessed. But as far as the phone she would have been in possession of the days and weeks leading up to her disappearance – no. So, in other words, the phone she would have possessed on the weekend of 4/25/21—we have never discovered that phone.”

Once the case was taken over by Michigan State Police numerous search warrants were issued including ones for healthcare records, phone records, vehicle searches, OnStar, social media, several land searches, residences of secondary parties and their electronic devices, internet-related accounts like Google and Yahoo, numerous financial searches, credit checks, and things of a biological nature.

Sgt. Detective Drewyor became aware Dale downloaded all of Dee’s iCloud information to a new phone. He did a search warrant for that phone in May 2022. Prior to that, there was a search warrant at Dale’s home to retrieve electronic devices. “We had collected, it must be over 100 Apple devices or electronic devices that day,” Drewyor said. None of them were the phone that used Dee’s phone number and contained her data.

A few days later, Dale called Drewyor from Dee’s phone number. Drewyor hung up and wrote a search warrant. “Upon arriving, I told Dale we needed that phone,” Drewyor said. Then, he learned it was in a vehicle parked outside the office, just yards away from them. “Dale was not complying with giving me that device,” said Drewyor. “I told him he needed to provide it and he did not want to do so. He refused.”

Sgt. Det. Drewyor eventually got that phone.

The preliminary examination ended before Sgt. Det. Drewyor finished testifying. It will continue June 6 – 7, 2024.

To see a review of the first day of testimony, you can go here. To review the second day of testimony, you can go here. For background information on the disappearance of Dee Ann Warner, you can start here. Join the Justice for Dee Facebook page for all the latest updates.