As we learn and grow as people, friends come and go. In some cases, some friends should go sooner rather than later.
Sarah Stern grew up a happy, charismatic, artistic child in Neptune City, New Jersey where she lived with her parents, and then her father after her mother’s passing. At 19 years old, she attended Brookdale Community College, studying arts and TV production.
Sarah was also a keen YouTuber, and was very involved in various YouTube communities. She thrived on creating connections between people, and engaging in artistic communities. She befriended other content creators, and even travelled to Canada, a country she fell in love with, to attend a convention for YouTube content creators.
Sarah surrounded herself by friends and family, and enjoyed spending time with those who were nearest and dearest to her. On December 2nd, 2016, Sarah suddenly disappeared, which alarmed her loved ones to great extent.
That evening, an Uber driver came across an abandoned Oldsmobile stranded on a bridge which connected the communities of Avon-by-the-Sea and Belmar, New Jersey. The Uber driver found the keys still in the car’s ignition. They called it into police, who had received a few calls about the car. They found that the car belonged to the grandmother of Sarah Stern.
Investigators immediately called Sarah’s father, Michael, who was at Disney World with his partner. Michael informed them that Sarah wasn’t with them, she’d stayed home in New Jersey. Immediately, he knew that something wasn’t quite right. He got in his car, and began the long drive back to New Jersey to figure out what happened to his daughter.
With permission from Sarah’s father, investigators searched the Stern home for leads. In Sarah’s room, they found her passport, Canadian currency, and other belongings such as her bank and credit cards. All things Sarah would bring with her if she had left of her own volition.
As the search for Sarah was underway, investigators discovered that she’d been hanging out with her best friend since childhood, Liam McAtasney earlier that day.
A neighbour heard from Sarah that day, and her daughter saw Sarah when Sarah dropped some things off to be kept at their house. Sarah made plans with her neighbour’s daughter for later that evening, and then Sarah and McAtasney left the house.
They spent the day doing things usual young adults do – they ate fast food, played video games, and hung out around Sarah’s house. McAtasney then left the house when it was time for his shift at a local steakhouse. By all accounts, Liam McAtasney was the last person to see Sarah alive and well.
When investigators interviewed McAtasney at his home, which he shared with a friend named Preston Taylor, he told them that he hadn’t heard from Sarah at all since he’d seen her before his shift. When pressed to see his phone, he told them that he couldn’t find it, which struck them as rather odd, though it wasn’t odd enough to continue questioning him too much longer.
However, McAtasney had some information for them. He informed them that Sarah did not have a good relationship with her father – but they already knew that this piece of information was false. Undeterred, McAtasney went on to tell them that Sarah had always planned on moving to Canada in order to get away from her father. He said he wouldn’t be surprised if Sarah took off while he was out of town. Investigators mulled this over, but ultimately didn’t believe that it was plausible.
Trying to get more information from McAtasney, investigators approached him on a separate occasion, where he changed his story drastically. He told them that he wouldn’t be surprised if Sarah had jumped from the bridge herself, as she’d had suicidal ideations in the past. He then asked investigators what the likelihood of her body being in the ocean by now would be if she’d jumped. Following this conversation, McAtasney parents hired him an attorney, who advised him to stop talking to investigators.
Preston Taylor was also spoken to by investigators. He gave them the same suicide theory, and then proceeded to cry inconsolably about Sarah’s disappearance. While suspicious, it wasn’t enough to hold him, and investigators let him go. For now.
As investigators looked further into the day that Sarah disappeared, they realized they nearly missed a large chunk of her day. And this information would lead them down the right path.
Earlier that day, Sarah went to the bank. Investigators discovered that Sarah had deposited around $25,000 in the bank at an earlier date, and they also learned that McAtasney was keenly aware of this.
One day, following the death of her mother, Sarah and McAtasney were doing some cleaning, when they stumbled upon a shoebox. Inside, they found a lot of cash, old cash which looked worse for wear. It turned out that Sarah’s mother had left it for her when she knew she was about to pass. She wanted to ensure that Sarah would be taken care of. Sarah spent some of the money – as expected – but she was also responsible, and deposited the majority of it in the bank.
And Liam McAtasney was there for every step of this process. And the gears began turning. Soon, Sarah wasn’t his best friend. She was his ATM.
As investigators viewed footage from the bank on the day of her disappearance, they found that she seemed very happy, and was chatting amicably with both the teller and the bank manager. As she left, she waved and smiled at both of them. They waved and smiled back.
More and more investigators realized that this wasn’t a case of a suicide or a runaway.
This was very likely a homicide.
The more investigators looked into the relationship between McAtasney and Sarah, the more they realized that he was obsessed – but not with Sarah. No, Liam McAtasney was obsessed with her money.
He thought that if he could rob Sarah, the money could solve a lot of his problems. And he made one crucial mistake. He told people about his plans to get Sarah drunk, and then rob her.
Anthony Curry was a friend of Sarah’s. He was a filmmaker, and often spoke to McAtasney about ideas for horror films. He knew McAtasney and Taylor socially, and he was disturbed by the story McAtasney had told him.
7 weeks after Sarah disappeared, Anthony went to police and told them what he knew.
Anthony told investigators that on Thanksgiving, he paid McAtasney a visit. McAtasney then told him all about Sarah’s money, and how he wanted to get her drunk, strangle her, steal the money, and then throw her over the bridge once he got it. Anthony was shocked, but self-preservation kicked in, and he kept quiet for as long as he could out of fear.
Investigators realized that McAtasney would never confess to them. As such, they asked Anthony for assistance. They wired up his car, and his phone, and came up with various strategies for Anthony to have a conversation about Sarah’s murder with McAtasney.
First, Anthony tried to get McAtasney to discuss Sarah over the phone. McAtasney seemed really suspicious of this, and suggested that they meet up in person.
The two met in a parking lot, where McAtasney hopped into Anthony’s vehicle, and patted him down right away, telling him that he was checking for a wire. What McAtasney didn’t know was that the video and audio recording devices planted in Anthony’s car were fully functional.
Then, without being prompted, McAtasney complained to Anthony about how the police and the FBI were investigating him in association with Sarah’s disappearance, as money was now a motivating factor. He was deeply upset about being a suspect, and felt it was unjustified. Then, he told Anthony a story.
He told Anthony that he thought killing Sarah would only take a few minutes. He was curious, so he decided to time it. He told Anthony that he tried to strangle Sarah, but that proved difficult. He then shoved a shirt down her throat, and held her nose closed. All in all, McAtasney said it took half an hour for Sarah to die.
The worst part, McAtasney told Anthony, was that he was expecting a substantial sum of money, upwards of a hundred thousand. He walked away with ten thousand dollars.
When asked where the money was, McAtasney said that it was buried in the woods, and he wasn’t even sure if he could deposite the cash, as the quality was so bad. He didn’t seem to realize that Sarah had had no problem depositing the cash for herself.
McAtasney went on to say that he kept the cash in the house he shared with Preston Taylor for some time, but he didn’t trust Taylor. In fact, he told Anthony, if Taylor knew that Anthony now knew about the night Sarah died, Taylor would kill him.
The conversation ended, and McAtasney left Anthony’s car without a care in the world.
Thanks to Anthony’s sense of morality, investigators now had what they needed to make some arrests.
On February 1st, 2017, Liam McAtasney and Preston Taylor were arrested in connection with the disappearance of Sarah Stern.
Upon his arrest, Taylor confessed immediately. He informed them that McAtasney had murdered Sarah earlier in the day, before he left for work. When he got off work, McAtasney called Taylor for a ride, and they went back to Sarah’s house. They placed her body in the back of the Oldsmobile, and Taylor followed as McAtasney drove to the bridge. Then, they both threw her off the bridge together.
Taylor also led investigators to where the money had been buried. When they arrived, they saw a safe sticking out of the ground. The safe was locked with a padlock, with the numbers 002 engraved on it.
When he was arrested, McAtasney had in his possession a key on his key ring that was also engraved with the numbers 002. When used to open the safe, investigators found approximately $9,350. The quality of the money matched that of the money Sarah had deposited.
At trial, the defence for McAtasney tried to claim that the story he told Anthony had nothing to do with Sarah, and had everything to do with a potential plot for a horror movie that Anthony was working on. Anthony refuted this profusely.
On April 24th, 2017, Liam McAtasney was convicted of a total of 7 charges, including: first-degree murder, first-degree robbery, first-degree felony murder, second-degree conspiracy to commit robbery, second-degree disturbing or desecrating human remains, third-degree hindering, and fourth-degree tampering with physical evidence.
Preston Taylor was convicted of robbery, and charges related to acting as an accomplice.
On June 28th, 2019, Liam McAtasney was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Preston Taylor was sentenced to 18 years in prison.
The body of Sarah Stern has never been recovered.
As a memorial to his daughter, Micheal Stern set up the Sarah Stern Memorial Fund, helping students earn scholarships to put towards their arts studies.
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Sources:
The Murder of Sarah Stern – Ashley Horsfall – The Blast
Friend Who Killed 19-Year-Old New Jersey Student Sarah Stern Gets Life Without Parole — Plus 10 Years – Brian Thompson – NBC New York
Court upholds sentence of man who tossed his friend Sarah Stern’s body off Jersey Shore bridge – Kevin Shea – nj.com
Liam McAtasney sentenced to life without parole for murdering friend Sarah Stern, dumping her body off NJ bridge – Allie Yang – ABC News
Sarah Stern murder: Accomplice Preston Taylor loses appeal to reduce 18-year sentence – Erik Larsen – App
Morbid podcast – Episode 121 – Murder of Sarah Stern Mini Morbid