Suzanne Morphew Vanished 5 Years Ago. Inside Her Disappearance — and Why Prosecutors Claimed She Was ‘Hunted’ By Her Husband

Suzanne Morphew allegedly went for a bike ride on Mother’s Day five years ago — and was never seen again.

Her bike and helmet were later found in separate locations “without significant damage,” according to CNN, and her husband, Barry Morphew, pleaded for Suzanne’s return on social media.

The public later learned that the couple were allegedly having marital difficulties. Authorities even told Barry that Suzanne had been having an affair with an old high school classmate, to which he allegedly responded, “maybe in God’s eyes this was his way of resolving something.”

On May 5, 2021, Barry was arrested and charged with murder after deliberation, tampering with physical evidence and attempting to influence a public servant in connection with his wife’s death, court records showed.

Barry pleaded not guilty to the charges, posted a $500,000 cash bond and was released from jail in September 2021. The charges were dropped without prejudice in 2022, and a year later, Barry filed a $15 million suit against the agencies that had arrested and detained him, but his case was dismissed in September 2024, per CBS News.

Barry was separately accused of voter fraud for submitting a presidential ballot in Suzanne’s name. He pleaded guilty and avoided jail time in accordance with his plea agreement, CBS News reported.

After all this turmoil, in September 2023, Suzanne’s remains were finally found in Saguache County, Colo., nearly 50 miles away from her home. Months later, in August 2024, the El Paso County coroner’s office released Suzanne’s autopsy report, in which her death was ruled a homicide, yet no one has since been charged in connection with her death.

Here’s everything to know about Suzanne Morphew’s disappearance, five years after she was last seen.

Who was Suzanne Morphew?

Suzanne Morphew was born on April 30, 1971, and grew up in Alexandria, Ind. She had at least two siblings, brother Andrew Moorman and sister Melinda Moorman.

Suzanne and her husband, Barry, met in Indiana and moved to Salida, Colo., in 2018. They were married for 25 years and shared two grown daughters, Mallory and Macy.

“That [family structure] where the husband loves being the provider and the wife loves being the homemaker— they fit that to a T,” longtime friend Jeff Isles told PEOPLE of the couple in July 2020.

Suzanne’s case file listed her as 5’4” and 120 lbs., with blue eyes and brown hair. She had twice beaten cancer and was an avid mountain biker, according to her husband.

When did Suzanne Morphew disappear?

Barry told authorities that the night before Suzanne went missing, they ate steaks, had sex and went to bed early, KRDO reported. He said she last saw her asleep in bed at 5 a.m. the next day and that he and his daughters had all texted “Happy Mother’s Day” to Suzanne but never received responses, according to the affidavit.

Around 2 p.m. on May 9, 2020, Suzanne sent her alleged boyfriend, Jeff Libler, a selfie of herself sunbathing, according to a 129-page arrest affidavit, but then didn’t respond to his following texts.

Now-retired FBI Agent John Grusing testified in court that based on data from Barry’s cell phone and truck, he came home at 2:44 p.m. that day. The affidavit stated that Barry admitted to “running around their property with a gun” and putting his phone in airplane mode at 2:47 p.m.

Barry told authorities he was shooting chipmunks, but Grusing wrote in the affidavit that he believed he was “most likely chasing Suzanne around.” Barry’s defense attorneys contended that data shows he was moving at 45 m.p.h. and thus could not have been moving on foot and “chasing” his wife.

A neighbor then reported Suzanne missing on May 10. Law enforcement and Suzanne’s brother, Andrew Moorman, led extensive searches but were unable to find her. After Suzanne vanished, Barry posted an emotional video online pleading for her safe return, along with the FBI tip line number and the promise of a $200,000 reward.

Investigators claimed that on that morning, Barry made five trash runs during his work trip to Broomfield, Colo. They alleged that he threw away tranquilizer material during one of those runs, per The Denver Post.

In August 2020, Barry told Fox 21 that he believed the Sheriff’s Department mishandled the case and that his wife’s disappearance was “the most devastating thing that has ever happened to me.”

When were Suzanne Morphew’s remains found?

In September 2023, Suzanne’s remains were found almost 50 miles away from her home in a remote area of Moffat, Col.

After the discovery, Barry issued a statement via his lawyer, Iris Eytan, in which he said that he and his daughters were “struggling with immense shock and grief,” as they “had faith that their wife and mom would walk back into their lives again.”

In April 2024, the El Paso County coroner’s office released Suzanne’s autopsy report, ruling her death a homicide, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said in a statement.

The autopsy report stated that Suzanne was killed “by undetermined means in the setting of butorphanol, azaperone, and medetomidine intoxication,” but added that there were no signs of trauma, according to the AP. The report added that “these drugs are marketed as a compounded immobilizer for wildlife” — in other terms, an animal tranquilizer — according to KKTV.

Per the Denver Gazette, Barry told investigators that he used the three drugs “routinely” to immobilize deer before removing their antlers. But, one of Barry’s lawyers said that the tranquilizer found in Suzanne’s bones was “very common,” 9NEWS reported.

Barry’s lawyers also told the outlet that a bullet and Suzanne’s biking clothes were found with her remains, though it was not clear if the bullet had been used, and that her foot bones and shoes were not in the shallow grave.

According to the State of Colorado, Suzanne’s homicide is an ongoing cold case.

What was Barry Morphew accused of?

On May 5, 2021, nearly a year after Suzanne’s disappearance, Barry was arrested and charged with murder after deliberation, tampering with physical evidence and attempting to influence a public servant, court records showed.

According to a criminal complaint, Barry allegedly killed Suzanne between May 9 and May 10, 2020, Fox 31 reported. At the time of his arrest, Suzanne was presumed dead and Barry denied the allegations.

Barry owned a landscaping business and on the day his wife disappeared, he traveled to nearby Broomfield to work on a construction site, investigators said. The couple’s daughters were away on a camping trip.

In the affidavit released in September 2021, investigators alleged that Barry tried to “hunt and control Suzanne like he had hunted and controlled animals” after she allegedly told him she wanted a divorce. Suzanne had allegedly accused her husband of having had affairs for years, and investigators learned that she had allegedly been having an affair with a former high school classmate, Libler.

Suzanne’s sister, Melinda, told local Colorado radio station Heart of the Rockies Radio in May 2021 that her sibling had raised red flags about Barry.

“She definitely made implications that she had concerns about her safety,” Melinda said, adding, “And the condition of their relationship had, I think, deteriorated quite a bit over the last several years.”

What evidence did investigators present against Barry Morphew?

Prosecutors said that Suzanne texted her husband on May 6, 2020, telling him she was “done” and wanted to end the marriage, 9NEWS reported.

In the affidavit, Suzanne is said to have taken “clear, articulable steps in January 2020 in attempts to separate from and divorce her husband, Barry.” The document also claimed that Barry tried “to determine if Suzanne was having an affair by stalking her at their own residence,” which was allegedly witnessed by one of her friends, and “knowingly destroyed evidence that his relationship with Suzanne was deteriorating.”

In August 2021, Chaffee County Undersheriff Andy Rohrich testified in a preliminary court hearing that when Barry returned to his house on May 10, he acted oddly. The sheriff alleged that Barry did not attempt to “call her phone” and was “not asking any questions,” according to the AP. Barry’s lawyer, Eytan, disputed the description, saying her client “followed the task as directed by law enforcement.”

In the August preliminary hearing, Grusing testified that a dart gun, empty tranquilizer darts and a needle used to inject tranquilizer into the darts were found in the Morphews’ home, as well as a tranquilizer cap. During a cross-examination by one of Barry’s attorneys, Dru Nielsen, Grusing said no tranquilizer chemical had been found and there was no way to know how long the cap had been in the dryer.

One of Barry’s attorneys later said that his client’s dart gun was not working at the time of Suzanne’s disappearance, and claimed he did not have the tranquilizer used in the darts for the gun, according to the AP. Prosecutors also said they found three unknown DNA samples on the glove compartment of Suzanne’s Range Rover, and one was a partial match to an unknown male connected to sexual assault cases in other states, 9NEWS reported. Barry’s lawyers said that his DNA was not part of that sample.

In April 2022, authorities dropped the charges against him, as the Colorado Judicial Department told PEOPLE. A judge granted a request by prosecutors to dismiss the charges without prejudice, which would allow prosecutors to file the charges against Barry again, at a later date.

In May 2022, Barry and Suzanne’s daughters, Mallory and Macy, joined their father for an interview on Good Morning America, the first since the charges were dropped against Barry.

“It’s been an emotional rollercoaster, but we feel like we can finally take our first steps in healing, which is a blessing,” Mallory said. “We just know our dad better than anyone else, and we know he is not involved in our mom’s disappearance.”

No further arrests have been made since Suzanne’s remains were found.

Was Barry Morphew charged with any other crimes?

Just a year after she went missing, Barry was charged with voter fraud — specifically felony forgery of public records and a misdemeanor elections-mail ballot offense — after casting Suzanne’s ballot for then-President Donald Trump in the 2020 election, as reported by multiple outlets.

In July 2022, Barry pleaded guilty to forgery, was fined and assessed $600 in court costs and avoided jail time with a plea deal, CBS News reported.

When federal investigators asked him why he submitted the ballot for his missing wife, he said, “Just because I wanted Trump to win.”

“To give him another vote, I figured all these other guys are cheating and I know [Suzanne] was going to vote for Trump anyway,” he continued, according to the warrant.

FBI agents told Barry that what he did was illegal, to which he responded, “I didn’t know you couldn’t do that for your spouse.”