Ryan Allar gets the press. He deserves the press, too.
Allar has led this double homicide investigation to an indictment, an arrest and extradition, and someday soon, a trial. The Chief Detective’s work also convicted Dalton Ray, an Oklahoma man who was sent to jail for lying to Allar, and Allar proved it. In court.
Turns out, Ray does know the defendant in this capital case that involves the murders of Tom and Angela Strussion in late September 2021. Not only does Ray know 33-year-old Andrew Griffin, but he also obstructed justice by failing to tell the detective he heard about the Strussions, too.
So, Allar must be on to something, right? But he also quickly credits Detective-Sergeant Jordan Blumling while trying to explain what life’s been like since the double murders took place along Trails End Drive in Belmont, Ohio, nearly four years ago.
“He doesn’t stop working, and there have been times when I’ve had to tell him, ‘Hey man, you need to take a break’. But Jordan really loves to work these kind of cases,” Allar said. “The way he looks at is, if he had family, and if they were waiting on answers from a case like this double homicide, he knows he’d want those answers. He’d want to know.
“A lot of the cases we work are very complex, but when we set out to find answers, we usually don’t rest until we figure it out. With the double homicide, there’s been a lot of answers that took more research than normal, but Jordan loves it, and that means he’s going to be successful as a detective,” he said. “There’s no ‘8-to-4’ workday as a detective and that’s OK with him.”
That’s because Blumling studied how to study.
“In college and grad school, I researched the different types of crimes that take place, and also the causation of crimes. That’s studying what makes a person do what they do,” Blumling explained. “I researched different types of violent crimes and property crimes, and we concentrated on what they do and why they do it. I really focused a lot of my studies in those areas because I like to figure things out. I did that as I studied the Strussion murders, too.
“Learning about the causation of crime really does help put pieces together. Knowing how that works allows me to do my job in a better way for the citizens of Belmont County. But that coursework can’t replace the on-the-job experience I’ve gained, especially during this Strussion investigation, and the help I’ve received from Ryan and others has been invaluable.”
Real Justice
It’s the cause of a crime. The why. The motivation.
That’s because those answers tell tales and reveal realities.
Examining the causation of criminal activity uncovers methods and motives, family dynamics and social influences, environmental and personal impacts, and, ultimately, why one party would commit a crime against another party. It doesn’t matter if there’s theft, assault, rape, fraud, murder, or another criminal act because Blumling is initially concerned with the cause because that’s what leads to a case’s most imperative conclusions.
He attended Ohio’s Peace Officer Training Academy before enrolling into the criminal justice program at Ohio University, and after earning his bachelor’s degree, he acquired a Master’s in Criminal Behavior from Tiffin University while he worked as a deputy with the Belmont County Sheriff’s Office.
On Sept. 21, 2021, Blumling was a Patrol Supervisor, but on Sept. 22, 2021, he was named a special investigative assistant to Chief Detective Ryan Allar and was later promoted by former sheriff Dave Lucas to his current rank.
That’s because Angela and Tom Strussion were murdered inside their Trails End Drive home early on the 21st and Allar immediately identified Blumling’s knack for investigative technology and knew it would be necessary.
“I’ve never been great with that stuff, but Jordan went to school for it, and I knew we were going to need a lot of resources,” Allar said. “We knew from the beginning of the case that it was going to be high profile. We knew it was going to be complicated, too, but we had no clue how complicated it was really going to be. It’s been a marathon and people will realize why once the trial starts and the facts start coming out.
“Because I knew how much work the case was going to be, I went to Sheriff (Dave) Lucas and told him that I could use Jordan for a while, and he reassigned him to me,” he said. “After a while, Sheriff Lucas made the move permanent because Jordan is cut out for this kind of work.”
That’s likely why Blumling reported to the house fire call on Trails End Drive.
“I went to the Strussion scene because something told me there was more to it,” he explained. “We knew what happened immediately, and that’s why we took all of the necessary steps to protect the crime scene. I called Ryan and told him what we had and what kind of investigation it was going to be.
“As time went on and facts became available,” he continued, “we’ve figured out what happened. It’s all been very different than learning about it in an academic setting in college or grad school. And I can tell you that reading about the suspects, the victims, and the families like I did in college is nothing like what you encounter while working a real murder case.
“Now, it’s all about getting real justice.”
