Victoria ‘Vickie’ Cushman, Scott Hornoff: ID’s ‘Scorned’ Spotlights Sex Affair And Former Cop’s Wrongful Conviction
Vickie Cushman, aka Victoria Cushman, had an affair with married cop Scott Hornoff, who was later accused of murdering her in her Rhode Island apartment many years ago. And tonight, Investigation Discovery’s crime show, Scorned: Love Kills, will air their case in detail. The episode, which is titled “Blunt Force Drama,” reenacts the case of a woman who is found bludgeoned to death in her second floor apartment, leading detectives to lose focus of the real killer as they zero in on an innocent man. In the real case, former officer Scott Hornoff was exonerated after Todd Barry confessed to the murder several years later, according to ABC News. Scorned: Love Kills will tell the story through interviews with law enforcement, journalists, and friends or family members who were involved in the case. An appearance by Scott Hornoff is also likely.
Victoria “Vickie” Cushman was found dead in her apartment at 56 Maple Street in August 1989. The woman had missed a shift at work when a friend decided to go to the home to check up on her. It was then that her badly beaten body was discovered on the floor. Vickie Cushman was dressed in a light colored robe, and her head was in a pool of blood. Police swarmed in and collected a few pieces of evidence that could be used to find the killer.
One piece of evidence that was collected was a letter that Vickie had written to her lover, Scott Hornoff, a married cop with whom she was having an illicit affair. He had tried to break off the relationship the day before, but it seemed that Vickie wanted to convince him to continue the affair. From there, the police investigation took off in the wrong direction. With little evidence to corroborate their conclusions, detectives were positive that Scott Hornoff was their man. After all, he was having a secret affair, though, he had a wife and a baby at home. Even worse, he lied about it before finally coming clean to detectives. Hornoff almost got off after his polygraph test showed no deception. But, someone within the Warick Police Department believed that there was a cover-up, since the other detectives hadn’t had a chance to interview Scott Hornoff, something that some of the detectives didn’t feel was right. Two years later, the case was turned over to the state, and once again, Scott Hornoff was the main focus of the investigation. He was eventually arrested for the murder of his former mistress and convicted by a jury.
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For six long years, Scott Hornoff did time in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, according to The Lubbock Avalanche Journal. And it seems that he would have continued serving that life sentence had another man not confessed. In 2001, Todd Barry walked into the police station to tell detectives the truth about what happened to Vickie Cushman that night. His guilty conscience had bothered him from the very day that he murdered her, which he says he didn’t mean to do.
Victoria Cushman had briefly dated Todd Barry before the relationship became strictly sexual. On the night of her murder, they hadn’t seen each other in a while, and when Barry showed up to her apartment high on alcohol and marijuana, she told him that she was dating a married cop who was about to leave his wife. Barry stated that the two argued as he told her that the cop would not leave his wife, a fact that seemed to upset Vickie Cushman. As the argument escalated, Todd Barry lost control and beat Vickie over the head with a jewelry box, then strangled her before disappearing into the night.
It was a story that detectives found hard to believe, but they knew it had to be true. A jury found 45-year old Todd Barry guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced him to 30 years in prison. Today, he is 59-years-old.
The community’s reaction after Scott’s release was one of resentment against the police department, who they believed botched the case from the beginning. Be sure to catch the new episode of Scorned tonight at 10/9 p.m. central on Investigation Discovery, as they take you on the long journey to justice for Jeffrey Scott Hornoff and Victoria Elizabeth “Vickie” Cushman. Last week, Scorned debuted the case of Ruby Ann Ruffalo.
[Image via YouTube]
