Members of the Las Vegas offices of the BLM, FBI and two assistant U.S. Attorneys, along with Lincoln County Sheriff Kerry Lee and some of his deputies, recently visited the murder crime scene on Kane Springs Road where 39-year-old John Chapman of Oakland, Md., murdered his girlfriend, 33-year Jamie Feden of Bethel Park, Pa., sometime in late September.

Lee said, “They wanted to see the exact location where the murder occurred.”

Chapman was arrested Nov. 15 in Pennsylvania and has confessed to the murder. He is being held in the Allegheny County Jail in Pittsburgh.

Lee said, “I know the officials are working with Lincoln County District Attorney Dylan Frehner to determine who will file the murder charges against Chapman.”

He also said from his understanding, “It looks like the FBI is definitely going to file federal kidnapping charges, but the still-to-be determined question is who will file the other charges, the county or the FBI? That’s the reason all wanted to visit the crime scene. But we’re kind of in a holding pattern right now, and I hope either before or after the New Year there will be more definite information as to whether it will be federal charges, or county charges or a combination.”

Feden was suffocated to death, stripped, tied to a signpost and left in the open, about a mile and a half east of U.S. 93 on the Kane Springs Road. Her body was discovered by a passersby Oct. 5 and was eventually positively identified by the Clark County Coroner’s office. If the FBI does file kidnapping and homicide charges against Chapman, because he crossed state lines in bringing Feden to Las Vegas and then to Lincoln County, a trial might be held in Las Vegas Federal Court.

Lee said Chapman might also face additional charges by Lincoln County. “He could receive two separate trials and two separate sentences, one from the feds and one from the county. The feds can charge him and so can the county.”

He said Frehner has received some of the preliminary reports prepared by deputies Mike Ray and Derek Foremaster who traveled to Bethel Park earlier this month and conducted interviews with police and Feden family members.

Lee said the cooperation his department has received from the Bethel Park police has been “phenomenal.”