ANNA MARIA ISLAND, Fla. — In our new segment Gone, Spectrum Bay News 9 Reporter Cait McVey and photojournalist Amanda Salvucci take a closer look at cases both past and present that have rocked the Bay Area.
- Sabine Musil-Buehler was killed on November 4, 2008
- Her body was found seven years later on Anna Maria Island
- William Cumber pleaded no contest in her death
- He was sentenced to 20 years in prison
- PART 2: Exclusive interview with William Cumber
In this latest piece, the team focused on the murder of Sabine Musil-Buehler, an Anna Maria Island hotel owner who was reported missing in November of 2008, after she didn’t show up to an election party for Barack Obama.
“The plan was after the election results came in was for us all to meet at a party. She never showed,” friend Nancy Ambrose said. “I just thought she left and went home already. I didn’t think anything had happened.”
Two days later, Ambrose said Musil-Buehler never arrived for work at Haley’s Motel, which she co-owned with her estranged husband Tom Buehler.
“She would not do that. She was so dependable,” Ambrose said. “I knew something was wrong.”
It would be seven years before investigators with the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office would find Musil-Buehler, buried under a beach pavilion not far from her motel.
So who killed Musil-Buehler?
Early on, detectives questioned a man named Robert Corona, who was found driving Musil-Buehler’s car. But Manatee County Assistant State Attorney Art Brown said Corona had no contact with Musil-Buehler and only stole the car after finding it abandoned with the keys.
Musil-Buehler’s estranged husband Tom Buehler, who had two life insurance policies on his wife, was also questioned. But Brown said ultimately it was just standard business practice. After all, the two owned a hotel together and remained good friends throughout their separation.
Instead, Brown said all along investigators had their sights set on William Cumber, the new man in Musil-Buehler’s life.
“Mr. Cumber was always the most likely suspect,” Brown said. “He was the last person to have been with Sabine. They had argued. You also had her blood being found on the couch. You had his blood on the floor of that same apartment.”
Cumber was Musil-Buehler’s boyfriend at the time she disappeared. They met after he briefly worked at the motel as a handiman, before being arrested for arson. According to friends, Musil-Buehler kept in touch with Cumber while he served time and once he was released, the two moved in together.
“I think he said all the right things,” Ambrose said. “I think she was in love with him.”
(Sabine Musil-Buehler with then boyfriend William Cumber at a campaign event for Barack Obama. Courtesy of Bonner Joy, The Islander)
The next turn in the case
In October of 2012, Cumber was charged with Musil-Buehler’s murder and in 2015 he took a deal, pleading no contest to murder in exchange for a 20 year prison sentence. Cumber also provided a confession and led investigators to her body.
In a recorded interview, Cumber admitted to arguing with Musil-Buehler inside their apartment the night of November 4, 2008.
“She said she couldn’t do this relationship anymore because of certain issues…I lose control…I hit her in the head,” Cumber confessed. “She gets scared and covers her face with her hands…I reached and grabbed her throat…until she wasn’t moving.”
Cumber buried Musil-Buehler just a block from Haley’s Motel. Brown said he suspects Cumber was trying to shift the focus of the investigation from himself to Buehler, though Brown said Cumber has never admitted that to law enforcement.
In part two of this edition of Gone, the team finally gets to the bottom of that lingering question in an exclusive interview with William Cumber himself.