When authorities arrived at the farm in rural southwestern Minnesota at 1 a.m. Thursday and asked Elizabeth Hawes about a large illegal fire, her response was: "That's not my brother."
But dental records indicate that the skeletal remains in the fire pit did belong to her brother, Edwin Hawes, 46 -- the same brother whom siblings Elizabeth and Andrew Hawes talked about killing several times in front of Elizabeth's husband, according to court documents released Monday.
In a plot allegedly involving accusations of embezzlement from the family business, Elizabeth and Andrew Hawes left little to chance, according to a complaint filed in Anoka County District Court. Before Edwin Hawes' body was burned, Anoka County authorities believe, he was shot in the chest by a crossbow at his Andover home, beaten over the head with a baseball bat, run over, and then taken across the state, where his charred remains were discovered at Andrew Hawes' and his girlfriend's Westbrook farm.
Elizabeth Hawes, 43, and Andrew Hawes, 36, were charged Monday with aiding and abetting second-degree murder. So was Andrew Hawes' girlfriend, Kristina Marie Dorniden, 29, who, like Andrew and Elizabeth Hawes, was found by authorities at the fire. The three are being held in the Anoka County jail. If convicted, each could face a maximum 40-year sentence.
The blood found in Edwin Hawes' driveway, on his home's exterior and on the undercarriage of his Volkswagen Passat was fresh when discovered by authorities last week. But the tension between the Hawes siblings was several years old, said Mark Miles, Edwin's employer for the past 18 months and his friend for nearly 20 years.
Elizabeth and Andrew Hawes believed Edwin had embezzled funds from the family landscaping business, said Lt. Paul Sommer of the Anoka County Sheriff's Office, a claim Miles substantiated.
"It's been an ongoing nightmare," Miles told the Star Tribune. "Andrew claimed Ed stole money and chased Ed out of the business at gunpoint." Andrew was arrested in September on a charge of first-degree assault, accused of trying to run over his brother with a car.
"Ed wrote in a letter, 'Listen, it's all easily solvable,'" said Miles, who has turned over records to the Sheriff's Office. "But they weren't going to listen."