Madison police said Tuesday new details involving UW-Madison student Brittany Zimmerman's slaying released by the Wisconsin State Journal would not hinder its investigation.
Zimmermann was found dead April 2 at her Doty Street apartment by her fiancé, Jordan Gonnering, who described her body as cold and lifeless, according to search warrants obtained by the State Journal. The warrants reveal Zimmermann was beaten and strangled, and stabbed so many times in the heart that Gonnering thought she had been shot in the chest.
The recently recovered warrants disclose 48 minutes passed between a 911 call from Zimmermann the day she was killed and when police were sent to her apartment. The Dane County 911 Center has been at the center of public controversy and scrutiny after mishandling Zimmermann's call and delaying police response to the call.
According to the warrants, Zimmermann's 911 call contained sounds of a woman's screams and an audible struggle. However, the 911 Center released a statement that an investigation found no evidence the dispatcher who took Zimmermann's call heard anything that indicated an emergency was occurring.
The Madison Police Department and Dane County officials have refused to reveal the contents of the 911 call in an effort to keep certain details from the public. MPD Public Information Officer Joel DeSpain said it would have been preferable, from an investigative standpoint, for the warrants to have remained sealed.
In any criminal investigation, particularly a stranger homicide, it is important to hold back some information,"" DeSpain said. ""If someone has information that has not been revealed to the public, we will move quickly on that tip and can use the withheld information to see if someone might rise to the level of a suspect.""
The seal on the warrants, which had been resealed multiple times by judges at the request of police and county prosecutors, expired last week and no request was made to extend them. In a statement, DeSpain said the failure to seek additional extensions for a seal on the search warrant documents was an oversight.
DeSpain said much of the information contained in the warrants is dated and the investigation has progressed.
""Although it is hard to quantify what impact there might be from the release of any particular piece of information, detectives don't believe the unsealing of these search warrant affidavits will jeopardize their case,"" DeSpain said. ""We remain very optimistic that it can be solved. The detectives continue to work very hard and are looking at a number of leads.""
