Man suspected in wife’s disappearance gets 8 years

Greg Tuttle

Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2000 | 11:21 a.m.

A 41-year-old Boulder City man who remains a suspect in his wife's mysterious disappearance more than a year ago has been sentenced to eight years in federal prison on unrelated charges.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Damm said David Kent Fitch has "no redeeming qualities" and should be sentenced to the maximum time allowed under federal guidelines.

U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson agreed Tuesday, sentencing Fitch to 97 months despite arguments by his public defender that Fitch's constitutional rights were violated by federal agents and he should receive a shorter sentence.

Fitch "vigorously denies" any involvement in the disappearance of his wife, Maria Bozi. He has not been charged in connection with that case despite efforts by the FBI to catch Fitch by using a covertly recorded jailhouse conversation with an undercover agent, defense attorney Art Allen said.

The bizarre case that started as a search for a missing woman from England -- Fitch's wife -- took yet another strange twist Tuesday when FBI Special Agent Henry Strumph testified at the sentencing hearing that Fitch had planned to escape from the North Las Vegas Detention Center by hiring a mercenary or bribing a prison guard.

Fitch also allegedly tried to get a former inmate to make a threatening phone call. This call, Strumph said, was to be placed to Fitch's other wife, whom he married after Bozi disappeared. Strumph also said Fitch was trying to persuade others to call foreign newspapers and Britain's Scotland Yard posing as Bozi.

After hearing from three separate inmates about the alleged escape plot, the FBI sent an undercover agent to the detention center posing as a police officer who could arrange to release Fitch, Strumph said. Fitch offered the agent $200,000 to help in his escape, the agent testified.

The escape never materialized, but the plan cost Fitch an extra two years in prison when Dawson determined Fitch attempted to obstruct justice and should have his sentence increased.

Fitch pleaded guilty in July to 10 charges, including four counts of being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition and six counts related to the possession and use of fraudulent documents. Fitch has a previous drug conviction.

The case began in September 1999 when the 46-year-old Bozi was reported missing by relatives in England. Bozi had met and married Fitch in England a few months earlier, and the newlyweds had relocated near Boulder City.

Fitch remarried another English women within a few months of Bozi's disappearance.

Fitch was arrested in Henderson on Feb. 8 after being stopped for speeding in Bozi's car. Several guns and fraudulent documents were found during subsequent searches of Fitch's property.

Other discoveries by the FBI at Fitch's home and a storage unit have led investigators to suspect Fitch of foul play in his wife's disappearance. Those items include nearly two dozen how-to books on murder and changing identities. Agents also found a false mustache, a voice changing device and an open package containing one of two air cartridges for a Taser, a personal defense item used to shock people.

Also allegedly found among Fitch's belongings was a receipt for chloroform dated July 7, 1999, two months before Bozi disappeared.