By Dominik Lobkowicz
Human remains believed to be Charles E. “Chuck” Woodburn were recovered from this shallow grave (foreground) at 219 Neck Rd. in Jefferson. (D. Lobkowicz photo) |
The man who married the ex-wife of suspected homicide victim Charles E. “Chuck” Woodburn says he saw “red flags” years ago suggesting Woodburn was buried on his Jefferson property.
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Charles E. Woodburn |
Meanwhile, a former stepson of Woodburn’s alleges his late mother’s new husband admitted to seeing Woodburn’s death.
The Maine State Police criminal investigation unit excavated human remains believed to be Woodburn at 219 Neck Rd. in Jefferson Aug. 27. The State Medical Examiner’s Office has reported the individual was a victim of a homicide.
According to Maine State Police Sgt. Jeff Love, who is overseeing the investigation, the cause of death in the case has been identified, but not yet released.
The state police and the medical examiner’s office are still working to identify the remains, hopefully through DNA comparison, Love said Sept. 8.
The remains found on the property were located in the front yard, only about two feet below the surface, Love said.
Woodburn, born on Dec. 4, 1951 in Newburyport, Mass., was last seen alive over 10 years ago. Though police are working to firm up a timeline, court documents state his then-wife had contact with him as late as May 2003.
Wives, children, and abuse
Court documents and family members allege Charles Woodburn was an abusive man. According to one of his daughters, Woodburn had a string of illegal marriages and children he left behind.
At the time of his disappearance, Woodburn was married to Diane Woodburn, and they lived together at 219 Neck Rd.
The Maine State Archives lists Woodburn’s marriage to Diane Marie True – also known as Diane Darling, Diane Woodburn, and Diane Gaudette, at different times – on March 8, 1991. Diane passed away in 2010.
Gina McWalter, a daughter ofWoodburn’s, however, said her father never divorced his first wife and “had a habit of creating children and not staying in their lives and not paying child support.”
McWalter had to track down her father herself at age 9, she said.
Valid marriage or not, Diane Woodburn filed for divorce from Charles on Nov. 4, 2003.
In a written statement in the divorce file, Reginald Achorn, Woodburn’s stepfather, said Woodburn mentally abused Diane and left her on two other occasions.
After family and law enforcement were unable to locate him and he hadn’t been heard from in six months, service to Woodburn to have him answer the divorce complaint was done through three weekly notices through The Lincoln County News.
The divorce was granted in February 2004 on the grounds of “cruel and abusive treatment and abandonment” and the Neck Road property was awarded to Diane.
Brian Darling, Diane’s son, also said his former stepfather, Charles, was abusive.
“We didn’t have a good relationship with my mother because of Chuck. Chuck was very abusive to us kids and my mother,” Darling said. “I took many, many beatings for my mother. I’d call him an [expletive] so he’d come attack me instead of her.”
McWalter believes Diane was deeply affected by the loss of own daughter, Amber Darling, in a car accident in 1995. Charles was originally reported to have been driving the vehicle, but the record was later corrected to show Charles’ brother, Calvin Woodburn, was the driver.
Even so, McWalter believes Diane maintained a grudge against Charles.
“I think in her mind she believed my father did [drive the car], because there was a newspaper article that said my father did. She kept that newspaper article underneath the cushion in her couch, that’s where I found it,” McWalter said. “She told me that my father was a murderer.”
(Ed. note: According to our June 22, 1995 story, Diane was also listed as a passenger in the accident.)
McWalter recalls several occasions when Diane asked for McWalter to give up one of her daughters for Diane to raise.
“That trailer up there [on the Neck Road property] – that’s how sick this woman is – that trailer is full of her daughter who died’s stuff. She went crazy, she really did, she really lost it,” McWalter said.
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The door of a trailer at 219 Neck Rd. in Jefferson is sealed shut with evidence tape Sept. 3. The tape had been removed as of Sept. 9. (Greg Latimer photo) |
Robert Gaudette, who Diane married after Woodburn and who is now a patient at Riverview Psychiatric Center, said Diane was devastated by Amber’s death.
“When I met Diane, that trailer was like a mausoleum to her daughter, Amber,” Gaudette said.
The bedroom was set up like Amber had just left for school – though Amber never lived in the trailer – and was decorated with dolls, he said.
“It wasn’t liveable because there was no running water or heat, but the trailer was spotless, clean, and it looked like Amber lived there,” Gaudette said. “I always respected the fact that she [Diane] had a tribute to her daughter to remind her of the love they’d shared. Her daughter was everything to her, and she had a good life before her daughter died.”
The trailer was sealed off with evidence tape Sept. 3, but the tape was gone Sept. 9.
Gaudette said he wasn’t aware of any grudge Diane held against Charles regarding the accident or Amber’s death, but said Diane described Charles as “very abusive.”
Gaudette has been a patient at Riverview since 2011 after being found not criminally responsible by reason of insanity for criminal threatening of a sheriff’s deputy in 2010.
Having undergone treatment, Gaudette was granted unsupervised weekend furloughs from the center in January, and is due in court in November for a hearing on his release, he said.
“The staff here helped me tremendously. I’ve learned coping skills to deal with any depression. I learned all the positive things; like to stay away from distorted thinking,” Gaudette said.
‘It doesn’t take a rocket scientist’
Gaudette was reluctant to say anything negative about his late wife, but admitted his belief Diane must have known something about Woodburn’s suspected death.
“As this story is unfolding, it’s almost evident that she had something do with” the disappearance of Charles, Gaudette said. Diane and Charles were together for 17 years, “now he turns up in the front yard. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to say she must have known something.”
Though he admits to speculating, Gaudette defended his late wife on the chance it turns out she had a hand in Charles’ death.
“If someone’s abusing you and no one will help, that might have led her to do something,” Gaudette said.
Brian Darling said he was not sure whether his mother was involved in Charles Woodburn’s suspected death, but does not believe she could have done it alone due to issues with her health.
“There’s no way she did it alone, she had emphysema. She had a massive heart attack. There’s no way she carried a body, no way. She had an oxygen machine in the house,” Darling said.
A new man on the scene
The timing of Woodburn’s disappearance also appears to overlap with when Diane met Robert Gaudette.
Woodburn was reportedly last seen alive in 2002, but divorce paperwork signed by Diane states she last had contact with him in May 2003.
Brian Darling also said Woodburn attended his aunt’s funeral in 2003 and signed the guest book.
According to Gaudette, he met Diane in April 2003 at a yard sale he held in Waterville.
“We just hit it off,” Gaudette said. “We spent months dating before I moved in” with her in late June.
Gaudette said he never met Charles, and though Diane had been with Woodburn for years, when Gaudette met her there wasn’t even a single picture or anything else indicating Woodburn had been in her life.
“I had nothing but her word that he had just left, and at the time it was good enough for me. I was in love with her,” Gaudette said.
Gaudette, who worked as a machinist for Maine Central Railroad, said he continued at his job until August 2004 when he was determined legally blind.
The couple married May 21, 2006, according to the Maine State Archives.
Less than a year later, in March 2007, Diane threatened to have Gaudette killed in a dispute, according to court documents.
After the couple argued for hours and when Diane attempted to involve a juvenile in what Robert thought was an abusive way, he tried to call 911.
Diane ripped the phone cords out, and was later arrested, according to court documents.
Diane returned the next morning, threatening suicide in front of the juvenile and threatening she would have somebody kill Robert if she was arrested again, according to court documents.
Diane later pleaded guilty to obstructing the report of a crime and violation of condition of release, and no contest to terrorizing.
Despite those issues, Robert Gaudette said he and Diane were able to move on together.
“We had a great relationship for seven years,” Gaudette said.
‘Red flags’
Gaudette never suspected anything bad had happened to Charles when he started dating Diane.
“She told me Charles Woodburn, he’d taken a large sum of money and left,” Gaudette said. “I never questioned that she was telling me the truth for a long time. It took me a long time to see all these red flags that never made any sense.”
The red flags included federal and state agencies Woodburn owed money to still attempting to reach him in Jefferson, and Woodburn never having any contact with his family, Gaudette said.
It was not until 2010, after Diane had died, that Gaudette spoke up about his suspicions.
Debris – rope, wood, and other materials – sits in what used to be the shallow grave of a homicide victim in Jefferson. Remnants of a blue tarp stick out from the ground around the debris. (D. Lobkowicz photo) |
Brian Darling said Gaudette spoke to him and his brother, Charles Darling, while Diane’s estate was in probate in 2010 and said where Woodburn’s body was on the property – near where the remains were actually recovered – and that Gaudette said he witnessed Woodburn’s death.
Gaudette denies making the statement, but confirmed saying he suspected Woodburn was buried on the property.
“I did, I believed he was buried somewhere, I never said where specifically. I believed that he had been killed. It was just too many red flags,” Gaudette said.
Investigation
Though the information about Woodburn’s suspected burial was allegedly reported in 2010, Gaudette said it wasn’t until 2012 that he was interviewed by the state police, and it wasn’t until February or March 2014 before they asked for permission to search his property.
It was around that time, on his first unsupervised furlough from Riverview, that Gaudette was met by the state police on Neck Road.
“They asked me if it would be okay to bring equipment or dogs to search the property, and I said yes,” Gaudette said.
It was still months later, around Aug. 3, when Maine State Police Detective Jonah O’Rourke shared his plans to excavate the property, Gaudette said.
“I was all good with that,” Gaudette said. “I had no facts. Diane never told me nothing. I was never involved with any of it.”
Why there were such large gaps in time between the alleged initial reports of Woodburn’s body on the property and the state police’s contact with Gaudette, or between Gaudette giving permission for a search and the remains actually being removed are not yet clear.
Sgt. Love was not willing to get into the specifics of what information the state police received and when.
“In any type of investigation where we received information from the public, we scrutinize that information and we have to evaluate the validity of it. That process can sometimes take a significant amount of time, a tremendous amount of effort and resources. We do everything that we can to verify that that information is in fact true,” Love said.
