EAST LANSING - How can you tell how long a dead body has been where it's found?

It's the kind of question Eric Benbow specializes in. He's a forensic entomologist with Michigan State University, which means he uses insects and microbes to learn more about decomposition.

Benbow was recently tapped to help a team of retired detectives investigate a sinister but widely disputed theory: that at least 45 college-age men found drowned across the country were actually murdered by a group the detectives call the Smiley Face Killers, named for graffiti found near the drowning sites.  

"Smiley Face Killers: The Hunt for Justice" on the Oxygen Network follows these investigators as they dive into the cases, including one Michigan case that dates back more than a decade. 

Todd Geib was last seen alive leaving a party on June 11, 2005 near his home in Casnovia, Michigan. His cell phone records show several calls that evening, including one during which the recipient heard an out-of-breath sounding Geib say "I'm in a field."

His body was found three weeks later in Ovidhall Lake, "in the opposite direction from where he was last seen walking," according to the book "Case Studies in Drowning Forensics," written by retired New York Police Department detectives Anthony Duarte and Kevin Gannon, who have been pursuing evidence of the Smiley Face Killers theory for a dozen years. 

Geib's death was ruled an accidental drowning and investigations have no reason to believe he died in any other manner, Michigan State Police Lt. Chris McIntire told Mlive in 2012.

According to the show's website, a smiley face was spray-painted on a tree near where his body was found and a smiley face sticker was later placed on his grave site. 

Benbow was contacted by officials from the show, who wanted to know what kinds of insects he'd expect on a body found in water and whether it could be a clue as to how long it had been there. 

Showrunners helped him organize a research study. Using undergraduate and graduate students, Benbow looked whether certain terrestrial insects would colonize a body in water in the same way they would on land and how long it would take.

It turned out blowflies and aquatic insects would do so within three days of the body entering the water, with "massive colonization" taking place shortly thereafter. He couldn't see any insects on photos taken from the scene, and there was no mention of insects in reports from that time. 

"I called some colleagues, and they all agreed that this was unusual to not have any insects on a body like this."

Benbow notes that it's possible that a body could sink to a deep part of a lake where oxygen would be lower, decomposition would be stalled and insects would be limited.

He also gives no opinion on the Smiley Face Killer hypothesis and was given almost no information about it.

He is currently writing up a preliminary report for the district attorney of Muskegon County. 

"Smiley Face Killers: The Hunt for Justice," premieres at 7 p.m. Saturday on the Oxygen network.


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