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Mother of 6 Raped, Strangled To Death by Co-Worker "Infatuated" With Her in Philadelphia Suburb
The body of Alice Hufnagle, 67, was found in an upstairs bedroom of her suburban Philadelphia home, and a blood-stained Scream mask was among clues found at the killer's home.
The body of Alice Hufnagle, 67, was found in an upstairs bedroom of her suburban Philadelphia home on November 23, 2002.
Her estranged husband, Jack Lauman, made the shocking discovery around noon. He’d gone to make a repair in her East Norriton Township home, and immediately called 911.
James McGowan, a now-retired lieutenant with the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office, recalled the scene. “There was a significant amount of blood,” he said in “The Creeper Killer” episode of Philly Homicide, airing Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen.
“She was naked from the waist down,” McGowan added. “There was significant blunt force trauma. There was duct tape around the forehead and around the neck of the victim.”
Evidence indicated a sexual assault and a violent struggle. In her final moments, Hufnagle had desperately fought for her life.
Who was Alice Hufnagle?
Hufnagle was a mother of six and grandmother of 10, according to The Times Herald. “A mama bear, for sure,” her daughter Susan Benatti told Philly Homicide. “She was just a beautiful woman, inside and out.”
Hufnagle had been working as a pharmacy clerk at the local Giant grocery store, where she was popular with co-workers and customers.
In the late 1990s, Hufnagle’s marriage to Lauman began to crumble. “He had someone on the side,” said Benatti. They’d split about 11 months before Hufnagle was murdered.
Investigators learned that Hufnagle had been financing Lauman’s failing business and that he was the beneficiary of a modest life insurance policy.
Though money can be a major motivator for murder, between DNA and other physical evidence, along with his solid alibi, Lauman was eventually cleared as a suspect.
Clues from Alice Hufnagle’s home
At Hufnagle’s home, a broken blood-stained bathroom window indicated how the killer gained access. Detectives also found small hairs on the victim’s leg that clearly weren’t hers.
The hair and blood samples were sent to the state lab for DNA analysis, which could take several weeks. Investigators knew that the blood at the scene was a significant clue.
“Maybe the guy you’re looking for has an injury or will have had to have some sort of treatment,” Bruce Castor Jr., who was Montgomery County District Attorney at the time, told Philly Homicide.
No valuables were stolen from the crime scene, indicating that the slaying wasn’t a robbery gone wrong. “We believed whoever did this targeted Alice Hufnagle,” McGowan said.
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Investigators look into Alice Hufnagle’s workplace
Detectives knew that Hufnagle had been at work the day before she was killed. “We wanted to see if Alice had any issues with any co-workers or with any customers,” said McGowan.
The store had 240 employees. Police narrowed the list of ones to interview. They went “through the files to find out who was at work on the day of the murder and who was not at work on the day of the murder,” Tim Lake, a former NBC10 Philadelphia news anchor, told Philly Homicide.
This line of investigation turned up no viable suspects. Police looked to the autopsy for possible leads.
What did Alice Hufnagle die from?
The medical examination showed abrasions and bruises around Hufnagle’s face and upper arm. It also revealed evidence a sexual assault.
“The final mechanism of death was asphyxia,” said Dr. Ian Hood, a forensic pathologist. “This was a case of a woman who was fighting back and struggling against a very violent act.”
Persons of interest emerge and are cleared
Investigators refocused their attention on those in Hufnagle’s circle, including her daughter Benatti’s new boyfriend, Mike Horani. He worked at a restaurant just a few miles from the crime scene.
“We had learned that Mike had an order of protection brought against him by his own mother,” said McGowan.
That raised a red flag and another one sprung up when police questioned Horani. “When detectives go to visit him, they notice that he has an injured hand,” said Lake.
Horani denied ever laying a hand on his mom. “It turns out that the restraining order was taken out by his mother, who was mentally ill,” said McGowan.
Horani said he injured his hand by punching a wall in anger, a claim that Benatti confirmed. He agreed to a DNA swab, which cleared him as a suspect.
“I was innocent. I said, ‘Take my DNA,’” Horani told Philly Homicide.
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Another possible person of interest who’d come to the attention of investigators was also cleared through DNA evidence.
Moreover, there was no one in the DNA database who matched the DNA profile from the evidence at the scene. But the hairs found on the victim were identified as belonging to a Black male.
In May of 2003, six months after the murder, Hufnagle’s children offered a $15,000 reward for information leading to an arrest. “It led to nothing,” said Lake.
Alice Hufnagle’s co-worker becomes a suspect
In July of 2003, police were at square one. They returned to Hufnagle’s workplace to see if any clues had been missed.
They discovered that Jeffrey Vample, a 24-year-old African American, clocked in for just 15 minutes the day of Hufnagle’s murder.
“He had gone to work and then he was sent home because [he] had an injury to his arm,” said Lake.
On July 25, police interviewed Vample at his workplace. Investigators observed a scar from a laceration on his right arm.
He claimed that he had emergency surgery from a lacerated tendon after “he broke a piece of glass when he was moving some furniture,” said Lake.
Vample agreed to have a DNA swab and to allow investigators to come to his home to see the cabinet with a broken pane of glass he said he’d cut himself on.
“At that point, I'd asked Vample if we could look further throughout his apartment,” McGowan told Philly Homicide. In a bedroom closet, investigators found a box filled with pornography.
In another box, they found a Scream-style mask streaked with blood. They also found duct tape with long, blonde-gray hairs stuck to it.
Police came up with a theory of the crime. “A good motive for killing somebody in a sex crime is that they recognized you,” said Castor.
Jeffrey Vample arrested for Alice Hufnagle’s murder
Investigators dug deeper for evidence. They found that Vample videotaped female co-workers from behind. In a startling discovery, they also found that Vample had made a notation on a calendar on the day Hufnagle was killed. It read: “My love. What a day.”
Vample was charged with Hufnagle’s murder. “Following the arrest, we continued to interview co-workers at Giant,” said McGowan. “We learned Vample was very infatuated with Alice.”
Police had solid evidence against Vample, but they pushed for a confession. He claimed that he went to Hufnagle’s home after fleeing two “stick-up men,” that he “accidentally inserted himself” into her, and that she was alive when he left her home.
Investigators didn’t buy that tale.
Who killed Alice Hufnagle?
After authorities revealed that they’d found the Scream mask, Vample made a full confession. He confirmed investigators' theory that he killed Hufnagle because she recognized him during the attack, according to Philly Homicide.
“He admitted that he’d actually gone to Alice's home that night hoping to have sex with her,” said McGowan. He ended up raping and strangling her. Blood on the mask was identified as Hufnagle’s, and DNA found at the crime scene matched Vample, more incriminating evidence.
On July 26, 2004, Vample pleaded guilty to first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison.
To learn more about the crime, watch “The Creeper Killer” episode of Philly Homicide, which airs new episodes on Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen.
