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COF820919 September 19, 1982; Archuleta Co.,
Topic Started: Jul 11 2009, 09:20 PM (1,649 Views)
monkalup
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Cold Case re-opened: Colo. deputy investigates 1982 murders with ties to FarmingtonBy Elizabeth Piazza The Daily Times
Posted: 07/10/2009 01:06:47 AM MDT


FARMINGTON — A 27-year-old unsolved, double homicide case has sprung to new life and is believed to have connections to Farmington.
Archuleta County, Colo., Sheriff's Detective George Barter reopened the case of two people who were murdered and left on the banks of the San Juan River near Carracas Bridge, where the river crosses the state line.

The skeletal remains of a female was found nearly buried on the New Mexico side. A short time later, the remains of a male were discovered on the Colorado side.

With improved technology in DNA and facial reconstruction, Barter hopes to discover the victims' identities and solve the murders.

1982

On Sept. 19, 1982, a local rancher looking for livestock along the San Juan River discovered a foot sticking out of the sand.

Buried were the skeletal remains of a female believed to be in her early to mid-30s.

Nearly one month later on Oct. 22, a family hiking along the river discovered the remains of a male, believed to be in his mid-20s.

He was shot twice, once in the arm and once in the chest, and she was strangled, said Barter.

Both bodies were completely skeletized and probably were submerged on and off as the river changed, Barter said.

He estimates, based upon the decomposition, that they both were murdered four to six weeks earlier.

Fortunately, the skeletal remains were complete and undisturbed by wildlife in the area, he said.

The victims' clothes also were intact. The female was wearing
blue jeans and a purple tank top and the male had on corduroy pants, Converse tennis shoes and a green T-shirt with the logo of the Lazy B Guest Ranch in Fallon, Nev., on the front, Barter said.
On the back of the male's T-shirt was a map of the houses of prostitution in the area of Fallon.

The logo on the T-shirt could be a clue, but Barter is not making any assumptions.

In the female's pocket was the number of a Farmington resident and Barter believes the two had friends in town.

Two pendants, one of a heart and the other of a chili pepper, Italian horn or animal tooth, were found with the female's remains.

But there was nothing at the scene to explain what happened to them, Barter said.

Information is slim, he said. One theory suggests that the two were hitchhiking at the time and picked up by someone who did them harm.

He suspects they were transient and believes they were in Durango, Colo., before the murders.

The male's remains were taken to Colorado for examination and the female's remains were taken to New Mexico.

The skulls of the victims were sent to Albuquerque for facial reconstruction, but they remained unidentified.

Eventually, the case became cold and remained unsolved.


2009

In February, the case file was found in the back of a cabinet drawer at Barter's office. It wasn't touched for years, he said.

Barter picked up the case and started from scratch. Initially, he made a five-page list of questions and addressed them one by one.

"I'm not leaving any rock unturned," he said.

The Farmington phone number found in the female victim's pocket did not lead to their identities, Barter said.

The skulls were located in the Maxwell Museum on the University of New Mexico campus, said Senior Deputy Medical Investigator Terry Coker.

The museum serves as conservator for skeletal remains from the Office of the Medial Examiner, and they most likely were stored there after the 1982 reconstruction, Coker said.

Investigators used the skulls for DNA evidence and facial reconstruction.

"The things they can do now for evidence are light-years away as compared to 1982," Barter said.

DNA was taken from a tooth from the male's remains and entered into CODIS, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Combined DNA Index System, a national database of DNA profiles from convicted offenders, unsolved crime scene evidence and missing persons.

No match was found on the male victim's DNA and police are resubmitting the female's skull to the FBI for more tests, Coker said.

The chances are probably good that the identities of the victims are discovered, especially with the advent of DNA, Coker said.

"It's just a matter of people who have people missing in their family getting a sample of DNA into CODIS," he said.

The skulls were brought to Bernalillo County Sheriff's Detective Mary Brazas, who completed two-dimensional facial reconstruction.

Using predetermined formulas based upon approximate age and height of the victims, the depth of the facial tissue was determined, Brazas said.

Brazas then cut tissue depth markers, placed them on the skulls, took pictures and scanned the pictures into a computer.

Once the photos were scanned, she drew the faces on a Wacom Tablet, which is a drawing board that translates directly to the computer.

The two-dimensional facial reconstruction is less invasive on the skull than a three-dimensional clay model, Brazas said.

Investigators are hoping someone will recognize and identify the victims based on the new pictures.

Aside from the reconstructions, part of the difficulty solving the case is because of a lack of evidence.

When the case first broke, some of the evidence was sent to investigators in New Mexico and other pieces went to investigators in Colorado. Over the years, evidence was lost, Barter said.

Barter believes the female was sexually molested, but he can't find her underwear, which was submitted in 1982.

"The hard part with this is a lot of the evidence is gone," Barter said. "If I could lay hands on the evidence, I could probably solve this tomorrow."

"They need to go home," Brazas said of the victims. "They need to be identified and go home."


Elizabeth Piazza:

epiazza@daily-times.com

http://www.daily-times.com/ci_12807409?source=most_viewed
Lauran

"If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente.


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monkalup
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Lauran

"If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente.


In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only.
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http://durangoherald.com/sections/News/200...odies_no_names/

Two bodies, no names
Pagosa Springs detective reopens 1982 murder case
by Chuck Slothower
Herald Staff Writer
Article Last Updated; Sunday, July 19, 2009

CARRACAS - Frank Chavez dismounted from his horse to examine what looked like a football in the San Juan River.

The cattle rancher discovered a human foot, attached to a dead woman, her upper body skeletonized.

Chavez went for help and returned later that day with Archuleta County sheriff's deputies, the coroner and neighbors to recover the body. The woman had been strangled, authorities later determined.

That was Sept. 19, 1982. A month later, on Oct. 22, another rancher nearby stumbled across a dead man who had been shot twice, his body in the river, eaten by coyotes.

Almost 27 years later, authorities do not know who the victims were, who killed them or why. George Barter, an Archuleta County Sheriff's Office detective, is trying to change that.

Barter has taken a strong interest in the case, re-interviewing witnesses and commissioning new reconstructions of what the victims would have looked like.

Months before their deaths, the couple - known as John and Jane Doe - were seen at the bar of the Iron Horse Inn north of Durango. They also came through Pagosa Springs, Farmington and Dulce, N.M. A witness remembers seeing someone matching the woman's description at the Bondad Hill Saloon.

"They ran all around this area during that summer," Barter said.

Someone, Barter believes, has gotten away with murder.

Links turn cold
Jane Doe was found with two pendants, one of a heart and another of an Italian love horn.

A piece of paper found in her jeans pocket had a name and phone number, but for years, investigators could not decipher the writing. Eventually, they determined it was the penmanship of Marilyn Cobianco, who lives in Farmington.

Cobianco confirmed it was her handwriting, but she could not remember Jane Doe or explain why her name and phone number ended up in a dead woman's pocket, Barter said. Cobianco declined to be interviewed when reached by phone recently.

John Doe was wearing a tan T-shirt with the logo of Lazy B Guest Ranch, a now-defunct brothel in Fallon, Nev. The reverse showed a map of brothels in that area.

John Doe's body is buried at Fairview Memorial Park in Albuquerque in a grave marked only by a number.

Jane Doe's remains were given to Block-Salazar Mortuary in Española, N.M.

"They put her in an unmarked grave in an unknown cemetery," Barter said. "Not to say that I'm done looking for her."

John and Jane Doe's skulls were separated from their bodies to aid in police reconstructions shortly after the crime, ending up in storage at a museum used by the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator, Barter said. That office did not return messages requesting comment.

Evidence lost
Much of the evidence connected to the case has been lost, including Jane Doe's clothing. The case file itself was missing until an Archuleta County clerk found it in an old file cabinet.

Turf disputes over the crime, which happened on the Colorado-New Mexico border, just east of Arboles, also have slowed the investigation.

Prosecutors in Archuleta County and Rio Arriba County, N.M., fought over jurisdiction of the case, Barter said. New Mexico State Police officers who now are retired investigated, along with the Archuleta County Sheriff's Office. Evidence was split among law enforcement in Archuleta County, Rio Arriba County and state investigators in Albuquerque.

Barter fears physical evidence was thrown out because of New Mexico's former 15-year statute of limitations on prosecuting murders.

Barter said if investigators "had just done their jobs and preserved what was there," the victims' assailant or assailants would be in jail by now.

"I feel like she was probably sexually molested," Barter said. "Now, with DNA, we could tag the person if we found those things."

Jane Doe, investigators believe, was 5 feet 5 inches tall, 115 pounds and had brown hair, although Chavez insists she had long, blonde hair. She was 30 to 35 years old. By the time Chavez found her, she had been in the river for four to six weeks, the coroner estimated.

Investigators know less about John Doe because his body was more badly decomposed. It had been at least eight weeks since his death when he was found. He was believed to be in his mid-20s, with a stocky build and reddish-blond hair. He may have worked for a carnival traveling around the area. Both were white.

Barter got Mary Brazas, a Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office official, to draw new, more accurate reconstructions of the victims with the aid of computer technology. Older reconstructions done soon after the crime simply used clay and wigs.

Theories emerge
Several theories have emerged to explain why the two, who may have been a couple, were killed.

Jane Doe may have been raped, and John Doe killed to get him out of the way, Barter said. It also could have been a drug deal gone bad. But Barter said both of these theories are only "wild guesses."

No car has been tied to the victims and they are believed to have hitchhiked around the area, Barter said. They likely would have had few possessions worth stealing.

Barter hopes someone still living can help him identify the victims and catch the killers.

"This case epitomizes injustice," the detective said. "If there was justice in the world, (the killers) would be in jail, and we'd know who (the victims) were."

A Colorado Bureau of Investigations agent in Durango, Jeff Brown, has helped track down leads for Barter. He said the bureau would not release any information about the investigation and referred questions to Archuleta County.

The case became a bit more eerie when Barter and Brazas went to visit John Doe's grave. They found it in a line of gravestones devoted to unidentified victims.

"There were fresh flowers on it," Barter said.

Ranchers look back
Frank Chavez, 76, and his brother Chris still raise cattle, goats, sheep, pigs and chickens at Rancho Juanita near where the bodies were found.

The remote area is about 18 miles south of U.S. Highway 160, west of Pagosa Springs. A dirt road leads to Pagosa Junction, a place on the map marked only by a church and a crumbling railroad depot. The Chavez brothers live south of there, at Carracas, near where the San Juan River dips into New Mexico.

The brothers think the bodies may have been thrown off the Carracas Bridge that spans the San Juan among cottonwoods and sagebrush on County Road 557. Both bodies were found downstream of there. But Barter said the bodies could have been dumped at any point upriver of where they were found.

The brothers believe the killings were drug-related. Trafficking and a lack of law enforcement posed problems in the 1970s and early '80s, they said.

"Planes used to fly by here real low," Chris Chavez said.

Once, Chavez came upon a cleared area that appeared to be a drop zone for drugs.

"The corridor here was drug-infested all the way up to Juanita," said Chavez, a former Archuleta County commissioner and Pagosa Springs businessman. "There was no law enforcement to speak of."

But Barter said the Chavez brothers' theory that the killings were drug-related is only "speculative."

Unsolved murders are fairly common. Nationally, 61 percent of murders resulted in an arrest in 2007, according to the FBI.

The killings shocked residents, Frank Chavez said.

"It was a dark day in our community here to have something like that happen in our backyard," he said. "We grew up with hardworking, honest people. In the '70s, it all turned. People were coming from all over the place."

Barter hopes publicity about the case will lead to the victims' identification.

"These people deserve to be known," he said. "And their families deserve to know where they are."

Posted Image
The sketches on the left were done recently. Photos of clay models made in 1982 are on the right.
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mimi
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http://www.kob.com/article/stories/S1777530.shtml?cat=500

Cold case reopened 28 years later
Posted at: 10/05/2010 8:17 PM | Updated at: 10/06/2010 4:37 PM
By: Liz Lastra, KOB Eyewitness News 4; Taryn Bianchin, KOB.com


Computer rendering of male victim

Computer rendering of female victim

"Gibson" jersey recovered

A 28 year old cold case in the Four Corners has been reopened recently with new leads that give detectives hope.

Two bodies were found in Colorado along the San Juan River near New Mexico back in 1982 but the man and woman were never identified. The only lead investigators had to go on was a hand written note inside the pocket of the woman. The note had the name and number of a lady in Farmington.

It took years for detectives to track down the Farmington woman. Once they did, she denied having any knowledge of the couple or their murders.

Another tip last October led investigators to a school bus near the area. Inside, they found traces of blood belonging to the victims. Then just last month detectives were given another tip and discovered a vehicle belonging to the man and woman. Inside the trunk of the vehicle was a red jersey with the last name “Gibson” on it.

Archuleta County Sheriff’s Detective George Barter believes the case can be solved with the right help. Barter said the original report shows a bible was recovered with the last name “Gibson” on it as well. He is convinced this is the woman’s last name.


Anybody with any information is encouraged to contact the Archuleta County Sheriff’s Department.


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reconstruction with drawing of jewelry
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http://www.abqjournal.com/news/state/23231...ate01-23-11.htm

Sunday, January 23, 2011
Colo. Detective Tries To Break '80s Cold Case
By Vic Vela
Journal Northern Bureau

PAGOSA SPRINGS, COLO. — George Barter sees the dead couple every time he walks into his office.

The Archuleta County sheriff's detective is greeted by the faces of a man and a woman who were killed nearly three decades ago.

Barter doesn't know their names or what they really looked like when they were alive — these are FBI artist renderings, framed and sitting atop a filing cabinet like members of Barter's family.

The woman's body was found in the San Juan River, just over the Colorado state line in New Mexico. It was September 1982. She'd been strangled. A month later, the body of the man, who had been shot, was also found in the river, but on the Colorado side of the border.

The woman was about 30, the man about 25. Barter believes the two were vagabonds who shared a romance.

They were buried in New Mexico. The man's tombstone in Albuquerque's Fairview Memorial Park has only a number to identify him. The woman, buried in an Española cemetery, doesn't have a tombstone.

Barter, a retired federal Drug Enforcement Administration agent who has been with the local sheriff's office for the past two years, wants to find their killers. Instead of calling them John and Jane Doe, he wants to restore their birth names. Giving the detective hope is an inscribed Bible, a football jersey and two jalopies that have only recently been found.

Crime scene

On a brisk day in December, Barter stands on the Carracas Bridge over the San Juan River and points to where the bodies were found. The bridge is in Colorado, in a remote area about 27 miles south of Pagosa Springs.

About a mile south of the bridge and inside the Carson National Forest, a beat-up yellow school bus rusts in the middle of a field off a private road. It's littered with debris inside, including broken beer bottles and a dart board. It's inoperable and serves as a target for locals and as a hotel for critters.

Unbeknownst to investigators 29 years ago, the inside of that bus was a crime scene.

"We found casings that matched the caliber of the reported murder weapon," New Mexico State Police agent Richard Mathews said. "We also found stains that tested positive for blood." Carpet samples from the bus have been sent to the FBI for DNA testing.

Barter believes that the male victim was shot inside the bus and that the woman might have been strangled there before both were dumped into the nearby San Juan River.

Now, the detective hopes to find the woman who owned the bus, Tina Madrid. Barter thinks John Doe worked on Madrid's ranch after leaving the carnival circuit. While at the ranch, Madrid allowed the man to live in the bus. Barter thinks Jane Doe also spent time with the man inside the bus.

Two years ago, Barter interviewed Madrid's old boss at the Elkhorn Cafe in Pagosa Springs. She told him that Madrid said she was dating the male victim and that the female victim was jealous. Barter does not consider Madrid a suspect. Still, he considers her "the most important witness."

A new clue

When the man was found in the river, he was wearing corduroy pants, white Converse sneakers and a yellow T-shirt.

Now, nearly three decades later, another piece of clothing has been found.

Last summer, police unearthed a partially buried Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme about a mile from where the bus was found. After digging up the vehicle, Barter, Mathews and other officers found a red-and-white football jersey with the name "Gibson" inside the trunk.

Barter said police in 1982 found a Bible inside the trunk of that same Cutlass. The name inscribed in the Bible is Lori Gibson.

Barter scoured dozens of missing persons databases trying to find that name. He did. A Tennessee woman by that name went missing during a school hike "a little bit before our victim was found," he said. The problem is, that particular Lori Gibson was a teenager at the time she went missing, meaning she may be too young to be the victim.

The recent findings have given Barter hope in a case that was once thought to be a dead end. But he knows mishandling of evidence over the past 29 years isn't doing him any favors in cracking the case.

The Cutlass was never taken into evidence. Police at the time of the murders knew of its existence and about the Bible found inside it.

Then, there's a box of evidence that included the woman's clothing, one that was mailed to the Rio Arriba County Sheriff's Office some 28 years ago. Inside the box were pendants, shirts and underwear. But Barter can't find it now.

He thinks the victims may have been killed by a small-time drug dealer who was angry that the man owed him money. As for the woman, she may have been "in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Drugs and payback," Barter said. "The most fingers have pointed that way. I'm not there, yet. But that's my most likely theory."

Barter's efforts to crack this case might be described as obsessive. He spends free time on Saturdays looking through reports.

"They were thrown away like garbage and didn't deserve it," he said.
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tatertot
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http://www.pagosasun.com/officials-work-to...ouble-homicide/

Officials work to exhume body in double homicide
By Randi Pierce

Authorities are digging into an unsolved 1982 double homicide — literally.

In the near future, Archuleta County Sheriff Det. George Barter, with the help of the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator, hopes to have one victim’s body exhumed in an attempt to obtain DNA samples for identification purposes.

He hopes exhumation of the second victim for the same purpose will follow.

The victims’ bodies were found along the banks of the San Juan River about a month apart in the fall of 1982, one found on each side of the Colorado-New Mexico border, about a mile from the Caracas Bridge.

Both victims are now buried in New Mexico, and much of the evidence in the case has been kept in New Mexico over the decades.

Present in that evidence was mitochondrial DNA, which is a general type of DNA useful in narrowing down to the female side of a person’s family.

However, Barter’s goal is to obtain nuclear DNA from the victims’ femurs. Nuclear DNA, Barter explained, is a more specific DNA, which he can then enter into the national Combined DNA Database (known as CODIS) in order to increase the chance of finding a DNA match to positively identify the victim(s).

The male, Barter said, is buried in the Bernalillo County portion of the Fairview Cemetery in Albuquerque.

That male victim, still officially a “John Doe,” has tentatively been identified as Richard Miller — something Barter hopes to confirm or reject through use of the test results.

But the timeline for the exhumation is unknown. Barter has been working to have the dig completed since April, but is at the mercy of OMI’s schedule.

“I think it could happen within a few weeks,” Barter said.

The cost for that exhumation, Barter said, is $1,700.

Following up with the exhumation of the female “Jane Doe,” tentatively identified as Lori Gibson, though, could be more difficult.

The female is buried in a church graveyard in Espanola, N.M., but the exact grave she is in is unknown, Barter said, adding that negotiations with the church are underway.

Into the Internet era

Beyond the search for additional DNA to test, the decades-old investigation is taking another modern turn — Facebook.

In April, Barter created Facebook pages for the victims, listed under their possible identities — Lori Gibson and Richard Miller.

Those Facebook profiles show the facial reconstructions of the pair, information about them, and photos related to the unsolved case.

Barter said new information will be added to the page over time.

The profiles can be found at www.facebook.com/lori.gibson.1610 and www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100005668510400.

“I think the older it gets, the less chance there is,” Barter said of solving the case. “Now is the hot time.”

A case gone cold

After an initial investigation in 1982, the case of the double homicide went cold and untouched until a few years ago, when Barter took it on.

“The case lives, because I’m working on it,” Barter said.

Over the years, Barter has worked to retrieve the skulls out of museum storage in New Mexico and, with that evidence, had new facial reconstructions created.

In 2009, shortly after Barter reopened the case, an old, abandoned bus located off the beaten path in the area of Caracas was searched, with positive results: a long, narrow strip of carpet attached to the floor that tested positive in five places for blood, in addition to four .22 caliber shell casings found.

At the time, Barter said the presence of blood found soaked into the bus carpet meshed with a number of testimonies gathered after the murder.

About a year later, an old car believed to be related to the case was dug up in the area of Caracas (the car buried to serve as erosion control) and searched, with a few more belongings found.

Since 2009, Barter has completed numerous interviews in efforts to further the case.

More recently, Barter re-interviewed many of those named in police reports and other documents.

According to testimonies, a scuffle ensued inside the bus — possibly over a dope deal gone bad — that ultimately led to the man’s death and the death of his female companion.

According to bits of evidence patched together during the initial 1982 investigation and Barter’s reopening of the case in the spring of 2009, evidence shows the killer (or killers) shot John Doe at least twice with a .22 caliber weapon, and strangled Jane. After the murders, the killers dumped both bodies in the San Juan River and, later, John and Jane washed up on the river’s banks just west of the Caracas Bridge.

Archuleta County rancher Frank Chavez found the woman’s body Sept. 19, 1982, on an island in the river about a half mile west of the bridge and about 75 yards inside the New Mexico line.

Chavez said he was out looking for his livestock when he spotted Jane Doe’s foot protruding from beneath the silty river soil.

About a month later, on Oct. 22, Jerry Killough, of Grants, N.M., was walking with his two daughters along the northern bank of the San Juan — the Colorado side of the river — when they discovered John Doe’s body, badly decomposed and partially buried along the river bank.

Although John Doe’s body was almost completely skeletonized, the autopsy showed, in addition to gunshot wounds, that he suffered broken ribs before his death.

At the time, neither body was found with items that might provide law enforcement clues to the identities, and authorities were left with only basic descriptions derived from medical examiner reports.

The reports described Jane Doe as a 30-year-old white female, 5-5 tall, medium build with brown hair. At the time of her death, she was wearing Wrangler blue jeans, a blue quilted peasant jacket, a purple halter top blouse and two pieces of jewelry: a hollow gold heart necklace and a horn-shaped pendant.

Authorities found a sales slip in her pocket with the handwritten, almost illegible name of “Marilyn Cobraier” and a Farmington phone number. She also carried coins totaling $1.36.

Medical reports described John Doe as a powerfully built, 5-8 white male in his early 20s, with straight brownish-blond hair, a reddish beard and moustache. At the time of his death, John Doe wore Converse low-top tennis shoes, tan corduroy pants, and a T-shirt with “Lazy B Guest Ranch” printed on the front.

Medical examiners said both bodies were discovered about four to six weeks after the murders occurred.

According to Barter, law enforcement officers and investigators from Colorado and New Mexico worked the case for five years and what little evidence was found led officials to believe there was a link between the two murders. At the time, former Archuleta County Sheriff Neal Smith speculated that drugs or prostitution may have played a role in the victims’ demise.

Nevertheless, and despite numerous leads, interviews and five years of work, investigators came up empty-handed. Some close to the investigation say the operation faltered because of acrimony between district attorneys on either side of the state line.

Eventually, with no one actively working the case, files disappeared and key evidence was lost. To make matters worse, New Mexico had a 15-year statute of limitations on murder cases, giving New Mexico lawmen little incentive to pursue an investigation that could not lead to prosecution.

In Colorado, however, no such limitation exists, and a case that had gone cold for 27 years turned hot when Barter joined the Archuleta County Sheriff’s Office full-time in February 2009.

Since then, and not hampered by Barter’s retirement from the ACSO, the search has continued.

Seeking information

Anyone who has additional information about the case is asked to contact Barter directly or Crime Stoppers.

Barter can be reached by calling 264-8541, e-mailing gbarter@archuletacounty.org, messaging Barter via either of the Facebook pages, or by contacting Crime Stoppers.

Crime Stoppers can be reached by calling 264-2133, visiting www.pagosacrime.com, or by texting “ACCST” plus your message to 274637 (CRIMES).
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