by Travis Mateer

While I do know a thing or two about the TWO autopsies that have now been completed on the body of Rebekah Barsotti, I’m more interested in asking some questions, and the first one is the title of this post: how many Sheriffs does it take to release an autopsy?

The question may be a little misleading because any given County in the fine state of Montana should only have ONE Sheriff at a time, and my understanding is that person for Mineral County is Mike Toth, but last March I wrote an article speculating whether or not anyone would notice if Toth went missing.

My speculation is based on reports of Mike Toth’s health being in serious decline, reports I partially confirmed when my phone call to a hospital in Billings got transferred to Toth’s hospital room, after which the sickly Sheriff hung up on me.

During the time that Toth was not able to discharge the duties of his office, Wayne Cashman was put in place as acting Sheriff. Then, of course, there’s the race for Sheriff involving Sheriff Deputy, Ryan Funke, and Gretchen Webb.

Another question worth asking is who OTHER PEOPLE think is the Sheriff. Maybe it would be worth asking Deputy County Attorney, Wally Congdon, who HE thinks the Sheriff is. Would he answer Toth, or Cashman, or maybe Funke?

Getting back to the autopsy, we know the body of SOME woman was found BY the river on May 17th. Here’s a question: was the FIRST autopsy done on May 18th? If the answer to that question is YES, then why did it take until June 2nd for the sickly Sheriff to give his brilliant NO HOLES summation of the crime lab’s work. From the link:

The Mineral County Sheriff’s Department says the cause of Rebekah Barsotti’s death has not been determined yet. But Sheriff Mike Toth says the State Crime Lab told him no gunshot or stab wounds were found on her body.

Mineral County is still waiting for an official report on the cause of death.

Yes, waiting for reports is getting pretty standard in this case. And what’s the date today? August 2nd. That means it’s been 76 days since a body was found and STILL NO AUTOPSY has been officially released.

How can this be?

Since June 2nd the people in authority who know things have been playing games about the body of Rebekah Barsotti, and this includes more than just Sheriffs. One glaring example of playing this cruel game seemed, at the time, to be more callousness than calculation, and that’s the antics of Wally Congdon, Deputy Attorney for Mineral County.

Here is a portion of Angela Mastrovito’s documentation of Mr. Congdon’s behavior directly before a court hearing regarding her daughter’s remains (emphasis mine):

After Angela greeted Wally Congdon in a friendly greeting, “Hi Wally,” Wally turned around and insisted on knowing why we were at court. According to him, he should be in a field bailing hay, and because of the SCHEDULED Hearing, he was losing $10K. Oh, and if it should rain, I would be causing him to lose even more money – all because he was at a hearing related to my daughter, Rebekah Barsotti. He went on to insist that Mineral County should not have burned a pound and a half of pot that was supposedly found in Rebekah’s vehicle. (I have a copy of the inventory and that is not listed; so they either falsified the report or conveniently left that item off the inventory list, btw, the tote box is not listed either). Incompetence or cover-up? You decide.

As I consider this interaction, the callousness vs. calculation argument is hard to see because the ways in which Rebekah Barsotti might be smeared, posthumously, haven’t been made yet. I assume that will come when autopsies (plural) are released and awkward facts, like tattoos documented on wrong appendages, have to be distracted from.

Since victim-blaming strategies of distraction really piss me off, a list of questions is currently being developed to ENSURE the focus stays on the right things. I can assure readers a very sharp mind is assisting in forming these questions, but some may be too sensitive to publish until the dust settles.

So stay tuned, and thanks for reading!