A head injury slowed David O'Dell mentally, though it never affected his kind and trusting nature. He lived alone in an old wooden house in upstate Wayland, N.Y., employed by his best friend, Joseph Meyers.
Little did O'Dell realize that Meyers would betray him. He torched the rickety old home, burning O'Dell alive in an insurance plot so Meyers and his wife could live the good life.
|Bigger plans
Meyers and his wife, Iryn, wanted to buy a double-wide trailer to upgrade their living quarters, and Joseph planned to buy two tow truck businesses. O'Dell was their ticket.
The couple virtually stole O'Dell's home out from under him — the first step in their insurance plot. They maneuvered to buy the aging house from O'Dell for half its value. Cunningly, they allowed him to continue living there. It was O'Dell's childhood home, a refuge for the aging loner. And soon became his fiery coffin.
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