A Pastor’s Tragic Legacy: Coincidence or Something More?
Wertynews.com – When CBS’s “48 Hours” initially presented the tale of Pastor A.B. Schirmer, viewers were left hanging. The clergyman faced accusations regarding his second wife’s passing, yet his first spouse’s death had already been confirmed. The pressing question remained: might he have been responsible for both?
Since that original broadcast, remarkable revelations have emerged. The answers, as it turns out, surprised everyone involved.
The Shocking Discovery
October 2008 brought devastating news to Rose Cobb. Her brother had taken his own life in an unexpected manner.
“It was a horrible, shocking, traumatic thing to have somebody not only shoot themselves, but shoot themselves in a church,” Rose Cobb said in tears. “I couldn’t believe it.”
Joe Musante was discovered in the church office, seated at the pastor’s desk with a single bullet wound to his head. He left behind his wife of 18 years and two children.
“My brother was dead and I didn’t know what happened to him,” said Cobb.
Upon arriving in the small Pennsylvania community of Reeders for the memorial, Rose noticed an unusual silence at her brother’s home. When she questioned her sister-in-law Cindy, the truth began to surface.
“And I asked Cindy about that. I said, ‘How come there’s nobody here?'” she said. “That’s when she told us what was happening.”
A Love Affair Revealed
Cindy had fallen for her boss, the family’s pastor. Rose was taken aback by this revelation.
“First I asked her … ‘Are you having an affair?’ And she said, ‘Well, that depends on what you mean by an affair. And then she explained that is was emotional,’ Cobb explained.”
“What did you make of it?” Schlesinger asked.
“Well, I mean, I guess I just felt like she just was so in love with him,” she replied.
The timing seemed peculiar to Rose. Cindy appeared almost euphoric during this difficult period.
“She was very giddy,” Cobb explained. “Giddy. Yeah, very childlike.”
“It’s a strange timing for that sort of thing,” Schlesinger commented.
“Yeah,” she agreed.
A Pattern of Deaths
As Rose learned more about Arthur Burton Schirmer—known to most as A.B.—she began noticing troubling patterns. Cindy mentioned that three months prior to Joe’s death, Pastor Schirmer’s wife Betty had perished in a vehicle accident.
“I said, ‘what happened?’ And she said, ‘Well you know … a deer ran out in front of the road. He swerved to miss the deer and – and hit the bridge or something like that, and she ended up dying,'” Cobb explained.
But Rose’s suspicions deepened when she discovered Betty was actually Schirmer’s second wife. His first wife, Jewel, had also died under mysterious circumstances.
“She said, ‘Oh, she fell down some stairs.’ You know something about a sweeper or something,” Cobb said.
“Really? She dies from falling down the stairs? And then the second wife dies from being in a car accident where the deer never even hit the car? It’s like what happened?”
“It just struck me as funny that so many bad things was happening to him,” she continued.
The Family’s Pain
Samantha Musante, Joe’s daughter, faced her own emotional turmoil. At just sixteen years old, she uncovered text messages between her mother and the pastor.
“She was my best friend. She took me to all the horse shows and she loved horses just as much as I did,” she explained. “I kinda felt betrayed that I found something like this out.”
“Were they that explicit that you knew what was going on?” Schlesinger asked Samantha.
“There was no doubt. It wasn’t ‘I love you in Christ’ type of text message,” she replied. “Not something that you’d expect your employer to be sending you.”
“Or your pastor, presumably,” Schlesinger added.
“Yeah,” said Samantha.
Samantha’s father Joe had been battling alcoholism throughout his life. He had turned to the church for solace while working as a carpenter, diligently repairing their place of worship without realizing his own family was crumbling.
Determined to stop the relationship, Samantha created a fake email account and sent a message to Schirmer warning him that someone knew about his indiscretion.
“I ended up sending A.B. an email from a fake email account, telling him that, you know, someone knew about what he was doing and that he should stop,” she said.
Unfortunately, her scheme failed. Cindy and A.B. quickly identified the sender.
“They took me into his office and told me that I was wrong, that nothing was going on and how dare I accuse them of an affair,” she explained.
“What did you say to them?” Schlesinger asked.
“OK,” she replied. “You’re talking to your mother and the pastor of your church and they
