North Dakota Man “Masterminds” Murder of His Business Partner with a "Written Plan”

A frantic and breathless woman called 911 in Spokane, Washington around 7:05 p.m. on Dec. 15, 2013, claiming a man dressed all in black, with a black mask, came into their house and shot her husband.

“Oh, God. Hurry. He’s gonna find me. I’m hiding in the closet,” Elberta Carlile told dispatchers.

She believed that she and her husband had been spied on as they returned home from a church event.

“Elberta said it looked like the shooter was waiting for the Carliles to get home,” Mark Burbridge, former homicide detective with the Spokane police department, said on A Plan To Kill, airing Sundays at 7/6c on Oxygen.

When officers arrived at the Carlile home, they found 63-year-old Doug Carlile dead and bleeding on the kitchen floor. Eight bullet casings were found in the kitchen. Nothing else was missing or disturbed in the home. Neighbors reported a strange white van in the neighborhood around the time of the murder. And a key piece of evidence was discovered: a glove, presumably dropped by the shooter.

“It was clear to me that someone had spent a lot of time planning their approach to the house, the killing of Doug, and then their escape route,” Burbridge said. “I knew this would be a very difficult case to solve.”

When police asked Elberta Carlile if her husband, Doug, had any issues with anyone, she gave them the name of his business partner, James Henrikson, and said they’d argued over the last few weeks. The two were involved with oil wells in North Dakota.

“There was this big promise of money. He was always looking for opportunities," Elberta Carlile said on A Plan To Kill. “Doug always kept me informed on everything that he was doing business-wise.”

Because Henrikson was a felon, Carlile started a business in his name to acquire $2.5 million needed to buy an oil lease to drill their own oil wells. Investors helped with the loan, and the investors were all promised a 90-day return on investment. But the business was failing, and Henrikson asked Carlile to sell back his part of the investment, but Carlile refused, according to his wife, causing the rift. But James Henrikson’s phone records showed he was in North Dakota, not Washington, the night Doug Carlile was slayed, ruling him out as the shooter. It was when police were looking into Henrikson’s past that they realized he was a person of interest in a missing person case dating back to June 2012: Kristopher “K.C.” Clarke.

“Even though it could be a coincidence that another worker or business partner of James’s had disappeared, it moved him up my suspect list and really ramped up my suspicion,” Burbridge said.

The Washington State Patrol Crime Lab got a match when it tested the DNA found on the dropped glove near the murder scene. It belonged to ex-con Timothy Suckow, who lived in Spokane, Washington. He worked for IRS Environmental, and had access to a white van like the one captured on neighbor surveillance camera leaving the murder scene. Police also found an important piece of evidence in Suckow’s personal vehicle.

“Detectives found a piece of notebook paper,” Burbridge said. “It talked about, ‘Arrange van.’ ‘Get gun.’ ‘Get driver.’ It looked like a list of about 15 things to prepare for a murder.”

Police suspected that James Henrikson had hired Timothy Suckow as a hit man, but needed to prove it. Suckow had a contact in his phone labeled “James ND” that they realized was a number for what ended up being Henrikson’s burner phone.

“So I now had a direct connection between James Henrikson and Timothy Suckow,” Burbridge said.

Timothy Suckow agreed to cooperate with police in exchange for no death penalty. He alleged a man named Robert Delao, who had been in prison with James Henrikson, was the one who recruited him to commit murders on behalf of Henrikson. He was first contacted in early Feb. 2012 and offered $20,000 to kill K.C. Clarke.

“Timothy Suckow says Kristopher Clarke has been trying to start a business of his own and trying to take some of James’s customers. James feels very betrayed by K.C. Clarke and tells him that K.C. needs to die,” said C.J. Wynn, a true crime author, on A Plan To Kill.

Then Suckow claimed he was contacted again to kill Doug Carlile for another $20,000.

“I think Doug was a pawn to obtain and facilitate that oil lease,” Elberta Carlile said. “Because as a felon, James couldn’t get contracts, so after he got the lease, he had every intention of getting rid of Doug.”

The planning of Doug Carlile’s murder began in fall 2013.

“They had staked out the location,” said Aine Ahmed, former asst. U.S. District Attorney, on A Plan To Kill. “They did some planning in terms of what their getaway would be afterwards. They certainly did plan in terms of what vehicle they would use…He brought a welding glove to break a window, just in case.”

Robert Delao corroborated Suckow’s stories. In January 2016, they both pled guilty to murder for hire and testified against James Henrikson. Suckow was sentenced to 30 years in prison, and Delao to 22 years in prison.

“Two people lost their lives over nothing more than greed,” Wynn said.

James Henrikson was convicted and sentenced to two life sentences for the first-degree murders of Kristopher Clarke and Doug Carlile.

“This case by far had the most planning and purposeful acts of murder that I’ve ever investigated,” Burbridge said. “Just never had anything like this.”

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