A broken connector to a dryer, the suspected cause of a natural gas explosion at a Wisconsin home in 1993, was repeatedly bent until it had cracked, an expert testified Tuesday at the homeowner’s federal trial on arson and fraud charges.
The testimony by Edward W. Holmes, an expert at analyzing how and why metals fail, suggested the break was intentional.
In examining close-up photographs of the flexible connector taken after the explosion at John Veysey’s home in Twin Lakes, Wis., Holmes said the nature of the cracks on the stainless steel pipe left him certain it had been bent back and forth 15 to 25 times.
Holmes, a co-owner of Engineering Systems of Aurora, was less certain that copper piping to an indoor barbecue grill in the home had been broken in the same manner.
One of Veysey’s lawyers pointed out that Holmes didn’t examine the actual connector, only photos.
Holmes said he was hired by prosecutors two to three weeks ago to examine the photos. Veysey’s trial is in its fourth week.
Prosecutors allege that Veysey caused the gas leak, igniting an explosion and fire that destroyed his house and enabled him to collect more than $350,000 in insurance.
Veysey is also accused of killing his first wife, trying to kill his second wife and young son by setting fire to their home in Cary and heavily damaging two other homes in fires–all to collect an additional $550,000 in insurance.
Cassaundra Kemp, the daughter of Veysey’s first wife, had testified that she saw Veysey working on the dryer at the Twin Lakes home the day before the explosion and that he sternly ordered her out of the room.
The family had gone away on the weekend of the explosion, even taking all their pets from the house, ostensibly so fleas could be eradicated, Kemp testified.
But Kemp said her mother, Patricia Veysey, later old her that she had defrauded insurers by falsely claiming to lose jewelry in the explosion.
Less than two years later, Patricia Veysey died. Prosecutors say John Veysey poisoned her to collect insurance.
