Mindi Mebane Kassotis (Georgia Bureau of Investigation, sketch by GBI forensic artist Kelly Lawson)
A husband and former Navy judge advocate is under arrest in Pennsylvania months after the dismembered remains of his wife were found on the grounds of a hunt club in Georgia.
Nicholas James Kassotis, a 40-year-old man also known as Nicholas Killian James Stark, was jailed in Pennsylvania on May 12, a day after investigators identified Mindi Mebane Kassotis, 40, as the woman found by hunters in the woods. from the Portal Hunting Club on December 2, 2022.
A “Dark Blue ‘Merona’ Long Sleeve Shirt”, “Cami Top”, “Light Gray Shorts” and “White ‘Amazon Essentials’ Underwear” were found with the victim’s remains. Further searches revealed other remains elsewhere on the hunting club’s property, authorities said.
“Initially, partial remains of a white female were discovered off Jones Road in the woods of the Portal Hunting Club in Riceboro, Liberty County, Georgia. Additional remains were discovered within a radius of three miles on the property of the Liberty County Hunt Club, as well as McIntosh County,” state investigators from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) said. “Additional testing has determined that the remains were placed in the area on or about November 27, 2022.
More Law&Crime coverage: Ex-Georgia cop now charged with kidnapping and murder of missing teen left ‘naked’ in woods
State law enforcement believes the victim had been dead in the Riceboro woods for a week or two before being found. Riceboro is about a 45-minute drive from Savannah, where the victim was living with her husband at the time of his death, authorities said.
The GBI credited the FBI in Atlanta, Baltimore, and Lancaster, as well as local police and sheriff’s offices, for their assistance, which included using genetic genealogy to advance the investigation.
“Investigative genetic genealogy focuses on building family trees for individuals identified as possible family members of the victim/suspect by combing through public and government records,” GBI noted. “FBI personnel then compare the people identified in the family trees with the location and time of the crime to identify the likely suspect. Finally, the FBI seeks a comparison between the victim’s DNA and the DNA of a relative of the victim to verify identity.
Suspect Nicholas Kassotis now faces charges of malicious murder, felony murder, aggravated assault and tampering with evidence. Authorities have further charged with removing body parts from a death or mutilation scene.
A November 2016 newspaper ad said the couple tied the knot in October at Morven Park in Leesburg, Virginia.
Mindi was a writer and businesswoman with a master of arts in public and international affairs from Virginia Tech, while Nicholas was a judge advocate in the Navy Judge Advocate General Corps, the announcement said. marriage. A 2017 news article identified Kassotis as the “Director of the Navy’s International and Operational Law Division”. The Virginia Lawyer Directory lists the defendant as no longer a member of the state bar.
Law&Crime has contacted the Navy for more information on the suspect’s work history.
Records reviewed by Law&Crime on Monday morning showed the defendant had been held in Lancaster County Jail in Pennsylvania since Friday afternoon under the name Nicholas Killian James Stark. His extradition to Georgia is as follows.
Do you have a tip we should know? [email protected]