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Friday, August 23, 2024

The Beth Potter/Robin Carre Murder Case

     At six-thirty in the morning of Tuesday, March 31, 2020 a jogger in Madison, Wisconsin came upon the bodies of a man and a woman lying in a ditch. The man was dead and the woman was near death. She died a few hours later in a nearby hospital.

     Dr. Beth Potter, 52, and her partner Robin Carre, 57 were found on the University of Wisconsin campus near the entrance to a 1,200 acre arboretum (a place where many kinds of trees are grown for exhibition and study). The park-like area was also a popular recreational site

     The Dane County Medical Examiner's office issued the rather vague statement that the manner and cause of the couple's death was "homicide related trauma." (The couple had been shot to death with a handgun.)

     Dr. Potter had been director of the Winga Family Medical Center operated by the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Robin Carre had worked as an independent educational consultant who helped high school students and their parents with the college admissions process. He had also been director of a local youth soccer organization. The couple had three children, two sons and a daughter.

     Detectives with the University of Wisconsin-Madison Police Department took charge of the double murder investigation. A spokesperson for the department told reporters that the victims had not been randomly killed. They had been, in his words, "targeted."

     On Friday, April 3, 2020 police officers arrested 18-year-old Khari Sanford. A senior at Madison West High School, Sanford knew the murdered couple's children who attended the same school. The victims' daughter, according to her Facebook page, had been in a relationship with the murder suspect.

     Khari Sanford was booked into the Dane County Jail on two counts of first-degree intentional homicide. The magistrate denied him bail.

     In late 2019 the high school football player, when his foster parents were visiting Africa, disabled the home surveillance cameras and drove off in the family car. Because he wasn't allowed to use the vehicle, a relative notified the police. A few days later officers located Sanford in the Madison area sleeping in the vehicle.

     Charged with auto theft, Khari Sanford was admitted into a deferred prosecution program that involved counseling and community service. Once he completed the program the charge would be dropped and his record wiped clean. In January 2019, while still going through the deferred prosecution program, Sanford posted on his Facebook page a photograph of himself posing with a pistol. He also posted comments about policing the police.

     In 2018 Khari Sanford had written the following on his Facebook page: "We gon (sic) change this world, cause it's time to let our diversity and youth shine over all oppressive systems and rebuild our democracy.

     On the day of Khari Sanford's arrest University of Wisconsin Chief of Police Kristin Roman said this about the double murder: "It was calculated, coldblooded and senseless."

     On April 4, 2020 the University of Wisconsin Police Department spokesperson announced that on Saturday, the day after officers took Khari Sanford into custody, they arrested his friend, Ali'jah J. Larrue. The 18-year-old was booked into the Dane Count Jail on two counts of being a party to first-degree intentional homicide. Larrue also attended Madison West High School.

     On April 7, 2020 Khari Sanford and Ali'jah Larrue were arraigned via a video-conducted hearing. Assistant District Attorney William Brown testified that on the night before Dr. Potter and Mr. Carre were found in the arboretum ditch, Sanford and his accomplice entered the victims' home to rob them. Sanford allegedly shot both victims in the back of the head while they slept. After what the prosecutor labeled "an execution," Sanford and his accomplice hauled the deceased Mr. Carre and the dying Dr. Potter to the arboretum where they were found the next morning. Dr. Potter was wearing pajamas and socks. Robin Carre was found in his underwear.

     The Dane County magistrate set the suspects' bail at $1million each. 
     Ali'jah Larrue in May 2022 pleaded guilty to two counts of felony murder and kidnapping. Later that month he testified for the prosecution at Khari Sanford's first-degree murder and kidnapping trial that resulted in a conviction on both charges. In September 2022 the judge sentenced Larrue to eight years in prison followed by ten years of probation. Khari Sanford received a sentence of life in prison.

3 comments:

  1. Please note---suspects booked in DANE County, not Kane County. Dane is the same county you correctly identify as having the Med. Examiner's office.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you. I'll correct my mistake.

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    2. They were taken to arboretum and executed there. Blood/brain spatter along with spent casings found with bodies.

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