The Final Moments of Tara's Life: Story Unfolds in Alleged Confession, Evidence

Mar 06, 09:16 AM

Current Headlines: By Christy Arboscello and Jim Schaefer, Detroit Free Press

Mar. 6--Stephen Grant and his wife did have a quarrel -- authorities believe that much of his story. But there was no mysterious phone call, no huffy late-night exit from the house, no escape in a dark sedan.

Instead, authorities say, the fight between Grant and his wife, Tara Lynn, grew uglier. With their young kids most likely sleeping in their beds, Stephen Grant, a 6-foot-tall, 190-pound mountain-biker and runner, went after his wife in their Washington Township home, and she tried to fight him off.

Something slammed into her head and her face, leaving noticeable injuries. Hands clawed her throat, bruising her skin and muscles, and eventually choking off her breaths.

Within minutes, the 5-foot-6, 120-pound woman was dead.

Law enforcement authorities, citing their investigation and a two-hour taped confession from Stephen Grant, painted a portrait Monday of the last moments of Tara Lynn Grant, a 34-year-old mother of two who was reported missing Feb. 9.

In reality, she never left her home alive.

Instead, officials said, Stephen Grant strangled her, then dismembered her body, perhaps in his family's tool-and-die shop. Then he scattered the parts among the brush and trees of nearby Stony Creek Metropark, a place he returned to in order to retrieve her torso so he could hide it in his garage when he thought search parties were closing in, officials said.

A Feb. 24 canvass of the park "caused him so much aggravation that he went out and got it and brought it back to the house," Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith said.

Hope fades to horror

The latest revelations in the case resounded in Michigan and across worldwide cable news channels Monday as police escorted the suspect to the Macomb County Jail from northern Michigan.

Stephen Grant, 37, had fled north Friday night, minutes before deputies searched his garage and discovered the torso.

Until then, relatives and friends of Tara Lynn Grant had hoped they were searching for a missing person.

Her husband had reported her disappearance to police on Valentine's Day, saying she had left home five days earlier in a dark sedan after an argument with him over her job, which required her to travel weekly to Puerto Rico.

He originally told deputies that she left after receiving a phone call from someone he did not know.

Stephen Grant's arrest in a park in northern Michigan early Sunday ended a three-week cat-and-mouse game between sheriff's officials, who had questioned Stephen Grant but denied harassing him, and Grant, who proclaimed his innocence in numerous interviews with the media.

"I think he had a lot of people fooled," Macomb County Sheriff Mark Hackel said Monday.

The alleged confession

Hackel said Grant provided many details of his crime following his capture. Authorities had tracked his footprints in waist-deep snow with a helicopter and night-vision goggles.

Speaking to detectives from his Petoskey hospital bed Sunday night as he recovered from frostbite, Grant clued them to actions he desperately tried to hide while playing the role of concerned husband and father.

"He gave us a very lengthy confession, laying out what took place," Hackel said Monday in a news conference.

Although at times Grant appeared upset, mostly "he was matter-of-fact," Hackel said.

Until Friday night, deputies had not searched the Grant home. An initial interview with Stephen Grant took place there, but he did not allow deputies to look around, Hackel said Monday.

Detectives finally obtained legal authority to do so when a magistrate approved a search warrant based on evidence found by a woman walking in the woods last Wednesday.

"It was a Ziploc bag in a wooded area not far from the defendant's home, which contained latex gloves, baggies, metal shavings and blood," Smith, the prosecutor, said at the news briefing Monday.

The metal shavings are consistent with findings in Stephen Grant's family's machine shop in Mt. Clemens, where the dismemberment may have taken place, Smith said. Deputies descended on the shop and the Grant home late Friday, detaining Stephen Grant, but then releasing him before the torso was found.

Evidence paints a grisly picture

Macomb County Medical Examiner Dr. Daniel Spitz said in another Monday news conference that Tara Lynn Grant fought for her life.

"Tara Lynn's body does show signs of an altercation and a struggle that took place between her and her assailant," he said.

He described the strangulation as an act that takes "a period of several minutes."

DNA testing in the Michigan State Police crime lab in Northville will include collecting samples from under her fingernails and ensuring more remains recovered over the weekend in Stony Creek are hers. It was unclear when those results will be in.

Spitz said his examination confirmed that she died around Feb. 9 -- the night her husband said she disappeared.

Husband makes a run for it

On Friday night, three weeks after he said she vanished, Grant was last seen leaving his home to walk his dog as deputies searched. He borrowed a friend's truck and fled north, officials said.

Grant embarked on an exhausting run from police. After a nightlong manhunt, he was found at 6:30 a.m. Sunday in Wilderness State Park at the tip of Michigan's Mitten, suffering from fatigue, frostbite and hypothermia. He had fled for hours on foot without a jacket or shoes, which were presumably lost in the snow.

He was airlifted to Northern Michigan Hospital in Petoskey, where he was treated for his injuries under police guard. By late Monday afternoon, he was transported to the Macomb County Jail to face charges of first-degree murder and dismemberment of a corpse.

He is scheduled to be arraigned on the charges today in the Macomb County Jail. Usually, arraignments are held in district court, but Hackel said the change is for medical and security reasons.

Authorities can expect any legal defense to attack the legal basis for obtaining the search warrant and his confession. Hackel said Grant gave his statement freely and was not believed to be on any medication during his recorded confession. Without providing details, Dr. John Bednar, chief of staff at Northern Michigan Hospital in Petoskey, said Grant likely received a pain reliever for frostbite.

Grant's former lawyer, David Griem, who quit Sunday citing irreconcilable differences, had said Saturday that he thought his client was suicidal. In Macomb County, Hackel said, Grant will be housed in a high-security section and watched closely.

Smith, the prosecutor, said Sunday that the case against Grant is strong. "We're confident in our ability to prove these charges. ... The way he went about his crime, it suggests he had a plan," Smith said.

On Monday evening, as Grant arrived as a prisoner at the Macomb jail in a sheriff's vehicle, about a dozen onlookers gathered to catch a glimpse of inmate No. 314500.

Angelo Gust of Clinton Township said he was there to "see how this sick sucker is today. ... You know what? If you're not getting along with somebody, get a divorce."

Contact CHRISTY OYAMA-ARBOSCELLO at 586-469-8085 or arboscello@freepress.com. Staff writers Suzette Hackney, Amber Hunt and John Masson contributed to this report.

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