MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Prosecutors charged a Weyauwega man Friday with killing a woman and her boyfriend 30 years ago in apparent revenge for a snowmobile accident.
Fifty-two-year-old Tony Haase faces two counts of first-degree intentional homicide in connection with the stabbing deaths of Tanna Tongstad and Timothy Mumbrue in March 1992. According to the criminal complaint, Tongstad's father was involved in a snowmobile accident in 1977 that left Haase's father dead.
Investigators wrote in the complaint that they've been working the case for decades and identified Haase as possible suspect. They did not say in the complaint how they learned about him. Officers took a DNA sample from him during a traffic stop on July 6 that matched DNA found on Tongstad's body.
He told detectives on Thursday that on the night the couple died he got drunk and started thinking about the snowmobile accident, the complaint said.
He went to Tongstad's rural farmhouse, where he said he fought with Mumbrue and punched Tongstad in the face, knocking her out.
He described moving his arm in a “stabbing motion” toward Mumbrue's chest and stabbing Tongstad in the chest as she regained consciousness, according to the complaint.
Online court records indicate Haase made his initial court appearance Friday. Waupaca County Circuit Judge Raymond Huber set cash bond for Haase at $2 million. Haase's attorney, Alex Gelhar, didn't immediately return a message seeking comment on the case.
