Search history, voyeuristic videos, a lock of hair: Documents reveal disturbing details of West Chester murder

CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19) - A murder case in West Chester keeps on revealing new information even after the man behind a brutal murder has already been sentenced.

Hundreds of court documents and search warrants show that convicted killer Michael Strouse was a deeply troubled man. In the documents, West Chester police say Strouse stalked Ellie Weik from Feb. 1, 2017 through July 29, 2018, using multiple aliases and spoof chat apps to interact with her, even posing as a friend “Nate” until Ellie got wise to what was going on.

“What’s this I’m hearing about some creep following you though?” fake “Nate” wrote.

“Who is this?” Ellie wrote back, to a number she did not recognize.

Strouse responds: “Who ya think?”

“Lol no one is this creepy to me, so idk,” she responds back. She later writes: “Leave me alone.”

Strouse later sends her a creepy, voyeuristic video he shot of Weik in her home, all while he is pleasing himself, just outside her window. Detectives say Strouse stopped using the spoof account the day Ellie Weik disappeared.

There was also a SnapChat account linked to Strouse and the harassing messages, with the name “HelpEllie” -- detectives traced his IP address and more, through Facebook, Instagram, Google and other social media accounts and all roads led to Strouse. There are repeated searches on his computer for sexually violent pornography, some which were for “forced rape while jogging,” “teen forced porn” and most we couldn’t utter on TV.

There were repeated searches for her home address, and “how to survive in prison.”

In Strouse's art portfolio, police found Ellie's driver's license, a lock of her hair, and a pink stone she's seen wearing around her neck in photographs.

Also, there were handcuffs still attached to his bed in the basement. Strouse told police Ellie agreed to shoot a torture porn video, but died accidentally from being strangled.

Strouse claims an LA contact pays him $5,000 to $10,000 per film. He claims he recorded her death, watched it, then deleted it and threw away the memory card. That video has never surfaced.

Police say Strouse buried her body in a field 3,000 feet from his home.

Later, Strouse admitted to police, he also took video of the female jogger, whom he stalked in Mason, which up until now, remained an unsolved case.

A Butler County inmate claims Strouse told him, Strouse murdered another female named “Shelly” in a similar manner, and dumped her body in an unknown location near a creek, but no connection has been made there yet.

Strouse is serving 17 years to life in prison.

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