Stella M. Nickell Case:
DECLARATION OF A. L. FARR

    I, A. L. Farr, hereby make the following declaration.  I would testify under oath to the truth of each statement included herein.

    I am a private investigator and have been a private investigator for 35 years.

    On or about October 5, 1999 a colleague of mine contacted me and related a story about a federal prisoner in California she believed might be innocent.  The prisoner was Stella M. Nickell.  After hearing my colleague’s story I agreed to speak with Stella Nickell and talk with her about the possibility of me taking on her case.

    I did indeed speak with Ms. Nickell who explained to me that she was completely innocent of the charges for which she was convicted, and that she had been trying since her conviction and incarceration to find legal and investigative assistance to help prove her innocence and successfully challenge her incarceration.  

    I agreed to take up Ms. Nickell’s case and do what I could as a private investigator to look into the evidence surrounding the Excedrin tampering case and the evidence that led to Ms. Nickell’s conviction.  Later, I agreed to search for evidence that would help prove Ms. Nickell’s innocence.

    When  first heard that the person convicted for the cyanide laced Excedrin case was innocent I was skeptical.  However, as I looked into the case and dug into and analyzed the evidence piece by piece, I became more and more convinced that Stella Nickell was indeed innocent.  

    Within weeks I was spending substantial time on her case.  To date I have logged over 2,500 hours investigating her case.  In my investigation I have uncovered wholly new pieces of evidence, and new pieces of data that shed additional light on evidence that had been previously discovered and used against Ms. Nickell in trial.  

    Much of the new evidence I have uncovered I do not believe could have been discovered previously, even with a duly diligent investigation.  In fact, the inquiry I  did in this case is by far the most thorough and far reaching investigation I have ever done in my career, and I believe that I have been duly diligent in all of my prior investigations.  I went well beyond this in my investigation into this case, and feel most of the material I found was found only through the benefit of luck as well as my supra diligent effort.  

    In my professional opinion as a private investigator I do not believe that the evidence Paul Ciolino and I have uncovered, that is relevant to proving Ms. Nickell innocent, could have been found previously through the exercise of due diligence.  

    Among the pieces of evidence I found were a witness statement from one of the Harborview Medical Center doctors who treated Sue Snow and spoke with her husband about potential cyanide poisoning when she was still alive.  This was significant to me because I then was well aware of cyanide not being a factor in this case until at least 72 hours or more after Ms. Snow’s death, pursuant to the King County Medical Examiner’s findings.  I found this document folded up in a box of documents given me by the City Attorney for the City of Auburn.  In order to obtain these documents I had to make repeated requests for any and all information they had in their files relating to the Ms. Nickell’s case in particular.  What I was allowed to review did not seem to be a full disclosure of the documents the City of Auburn must have had, and they appeared to have been pretty well “picked over” to the point where nothing was of value to me.  

However, in the box of documents I was given, folded up among some other materials, I found the Dr. Trimble witness statement.  After obtaining this document I proceeded to interview Dr. Trimble.  He represented to me that the contents of the witness statement were true when he wrote them and that even today, he has an independent  recollection of the events included in the witness statement.  Dr. Trimble represented to me that he did not follow the Exedrin cyanide case or Stella Nickell’s case because he moved to Alaska.

    More evidence was obtained in response to a Federal FOIA request submitted by Dr. Frederic Whitehurst.  The document was produced along with around 1000 other documents related to the government’s laboratory work in the Excedrin case.  The memo shows that the FBI knew Stella Nickell purchased both tainted bottles of cyanide found in her home at the same store, and not two separate stores as was stated at her trial.  

    In connection with my investigation in Stella Nickell’s case I interviewed extensively her former neighbor, Sandy Scott.  Sandy Scott explained to me how agents for the FBI used her to search Stella Nickell’s home and how Sandy Scott, at the request of the FBI kept a diary and a log regarding her sightings and contacts with Stella Nickell.  Obtaining the information that Sandy Scott and her husband Harold Scott had regarding the FBI, algaecide and Sandy Scott’s searches of Stella Nickell’s home is not something that would have been done in a normal diligent investigation of Stella Nickell’s case.  In my opinion as a private investigator with 35 years experience, a diligent investigator would not have contacted persons such as Sandy Scott, with no apparent connection to Stella Nickell’s case on the off chance that they may have some important information.  I believe that finding this information required well more than diligence.  

In connection with my investigation I interviewed extensively Ms. Anna Joe Rider.  She related a disturbing sequence of events regarding FBI Agent Cusack and his dealings with Ms. Rider concerning Stella Nickell and the cyanide laced Excedrin case.  As was the case with Sandy Scott, I believe that a “merely” diligent investigator would not have interviewed Ms. Rider, a person who did not testify at Stella Nickell’s trial, in the hopes that she might have important information.  One of the things she related to me was her understanding of the “I know what you’re thinking and the answer is no” remark attributed to Ms. Nickell.  Ms. Rider’s understanding of it was that Ms. Nickell was trying to let Cindy Hamilton (Baca) know that Bruce Nickell was not carrying any animosity toward her when he died.

As part of my investigation I found that  Ms. Darlene Seaders committed suicide around the time of the deaths of Sue Snow and Bruce Nickell.  I found out that she committed suicide by injecting cyanide and that when found she had in her possession numerous empty capsules of the same sort and color used to contain Excedrin, and a pound of raw cyanide.  I found it particularly significant that she passed away roughly 90-days subsequent to the deaths of Bruce Nickell and Sue Snow.  

    In connection with my investigation I personally watched certain videotaped media broadcasts from the time of the cyanide poisonings.  In one such broadcast, FBI Agent Cusack stated that Paul Webking “passed” a polygraph test that focused on questions surrounding the deaths of his wife Sue Snow and product tampering.  I also watched another broadcast where Agent Cusack quoted Paul Webking stating, “You’re never going to find who did this”, almost immediately after his polygraph examination.

    In connection with my investigation of Stella Nickell’s case I interviewed extensively Ms. Cynthia Baca, f/k/a Cynthia Hamilton, Stella Nickell’s daughter.  Ms. Baca described to me her lifestyle before, during and after her testimony against her mother.  She described using methamphetamine regularly.  

    However at one point in one of my interviews with her she stated that she did not use methamphetamine or any other drug during the time surrounding her testimony against her mother.  At another point in one of my interviews with her she contradicted herself by explaining that she lived with a person named Steve Strong at the time and that she “always” used methamphetamine when she lived with him because she could, and did on many occasions obtain the drug easily and directly from Mr. Strong.  

    In one of my interviews with Ms. Baca I asked her about the reward money she had received for her testimony against her mother.  She stated that it was taken almost in it’s entirety by the “government” because of tax problems.  In another interview, upon more in-depth questioning as to the “tax problem” and how it arose Baca totally recanted and admitted that the money “…went up <her> and her husband’s noses within only 2 1⁄2 years her receiving the reward money.  

    In connection with my investigation into Stella Nickell’s case I reviewed numerous FBI memoranda and reports.  From my review of certain of these documents it was clear that Ms. Baca initially, and even after being interviewed by the FBI a second time, reported none of the terribly damaging things about her mother that she testified to at her trial.  In fact, when initially interviewed by the FBI she stated her mother and step-father had a good marriage and that nothing in her mind implicated her mother in the tampering case or the death of Bruce Nickell.  

    In connection with my investigation into Stella Nickell’s case, I interviewed Mr. Thomas Noonan.  He stated to me that when approached by the FBI regarding Ms. Nickell and the tampering case he wanted to “help out” and to “help out with their case” because Sue Snow had been for many years a family friend and financial consultant, and among other things had helped Mr. Noonan finance his first car.

Noonan further stated to me that he never recalled selling Stella Nickell algaecide tablets and didn’t recall ever telling her to crush them up.  He stated that he made these statements to the FBI because it seemed like it would help their case and because he didn’t specifically remember not selling the solid algaecide to her and because he didn’t specifically remember not telling her to crush such a product up.  He also stated that if he did sell her such a product that he probably would have told her to crush it up because that is what he generally told people to do with that product.  

    Noonan stated that he did not special order any algaecide product for Stella Nickell, although he testified that he did at her trial.  He stated that the solid algaecide products, including the “algae-destroyer” product that he said he sold Stella Nickell were ordered in the same inventory process as the other products in the store.  

    In connection with my investigation into Stella Nickell’s case I uncovered the actual order slips from the Fish Gallery and Pets store where Thomas Noonan worked at the time Stella Nickell purportedly special ordered the “Algae Destroyer” product.  These slips are attached hereto as Exhibit “A”.     I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct.

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A.    L. Farr
Place Signed:_____________
Date Signed:_____________
Address of Declarant: ________________________