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| AR: renewing cold cases in Ft. Smith | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jun 2 2014, 06:14 PM (128 Views) | |
| Ell | Jun 2 2014, 06:14 PM Post #1 |
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Heart of Gold
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By Stacy RyburnTimes Record • sryburn@swtimes.com Editor’s Note: The Times Record today begins a weeklong series of reports looking at unsolved missing persons cases at the Fort Smith Police Department. Monday: Teen’s disappearance takes toll on family. When a person goes missing, detectives assigned to the case check all possible leads. Sometimes, those leads garner results and the person is found. Other times, the case goes cold. In those instances, the Fort Smith Police Department has posted information on its website, www.fortsmithpd.org, for all people reported missing in the city and whose cases have gone cold. The department first posted the page in 2006 as a way for anyone with information on a missing person and an Internet connection to easily reach a detective working the case. Each new detective in the Criminal Investigations Division is assigned a cold case with which to become familiar. As of today, the department has seven unsolved missing-persons cases: Anthony Ross Allen, Linda Louellen “Lindy” Reynolds, Verna Sue Hollingsworth, Lori Murchison, Gerald Bingham, Junior Lee McCormick and Norma Alicia Luevano-Garcia. Two cases posted in 2006 have since been solved: Mark Oswin Simpson and Howard Myers. Three of the active cases — Allen, Murchison and McCormick — list foul play as suspected. Allen was reported missing in October 1978 when he was 16 years old. He had left his Fort Smith home to live with friends in Cedarville; the friends reported Allen went to an uncle’s home in the Pittsburg County city of Hartshorne in Oklahoma. Allen’s loved ones have not heard from him since. Murchison was reported missing Sept. 5, 1995, when she was 24 years old. She was last seen Sept. 2, 1995, at the Continental Motel in Fort Smith. Several leads developed in the investigation with no definitive results. McCormick was last seen July 14, 2001, when he was 26 years old, at Perry’s Place bar in Fort Smith. Acquaintances said he was last seen walking away from the bar. His family reported McCormick missing. The other four cold cases — Reynolds, Hollingsworth, Bingham and Luevano-Garcia — do not mention foul play. Reynolds was last seen May 17, 1982, when she was 30 years old. She went to a club in Oklahoma, and returned to her parents’ home, where she lived. Reynolds left a note saying she would return in time for work at 5 p.m. the next day and never returned. Hollingsworth’s daughter reported her missing July 14, 1985, when Hollingsworth was 43 years old. Hollingsworth’s daughter went to visit her in Fort Smith from Texas. Hollingsworth’s car was parked and her residence locked, but she was not there. The air conditioner in the home was running and there was no padlock on the door, which was unusual, her daughter said. Hollingsworth was never located. Bingham’s nephew reported him missing June 17, 2000, when Bingham was 69 years old. Neighbors last saw Bingham on June 8, 2000, leaving his residence about 2 a.m. He previously had told the neighbors he was planning to go to Talihina. Bingham’s car was found on Cavanal Mountain near Poteau. A witness told authorities he had given Bingham a ride to a nearby community, but had taken him back and returned Bingham to the rugged area. Luevano-Garcia’s husband reported her missing in July 2006 when she was 25 years old. Police received initial reports that she might have been with a man, who was later located. Police then received information that Luevano-Garcia possibly left Fort Smith to travel to either Arizona or California, where she has relatives. No one at the Police Department has been able to make contact with anyone in Luevano-Garcia’s family since she went missing. They were not U.S. citizens, and the department has no record of anyone involved with the case. Because of this, there have been no leads or further information since 2006 on Luevano-Garcia’s whereabouts, said detective Jeff Carter, who has been assigned the case. “She’s still listed as missing, but we have no information of her or her family that reported her as missing, or even how to contact them,” Carter said. “We don’t know if they went back to Mexico, or what the situation is with that.” Luevano-Garcia has been excluded from this series of reports. The other two people reported missing have since been found. Mark Oswin Simpson went to pick up his paycheck on March 17, 1999, and told his boss he was going to move to Florida. His sister had reported he never showed up in Florida; however, Houston police contacted the Fort Smith Police Department on June 21, 2007, and told them Simpson was in their custody and he was fine. On March 4, 2005, the daughter of Howard Myers reported her father missing. It was later discovered that Myers had moved to Hot Springs, then to Sheridan, Wyo., in 2007. The Sheridan Police Department contacted Fort Smith on July 15, 2008, to let them know Myers was living with another daughter. Before a case goes cold, detectives check every bit of information that possibly could lead them somewhere, said Cpl. Patricia Sullivan. “Any lead that we did receive, or tip, it was checked as thoroughly as possible,” Sullivan said. “On the missing-persons cases, the detectives do as much follow-up as they can. They’re going to collect DNA from relatives.” All of the department’s current missing-persons cold cases go to Sgt. Poncho Davis, who assigns the cases to a detective. “Any time a new guy gets one, I have him go through the complete case file to make sure he’s a little bit familiar with it,” Davis said. “A fresh set of eyes may see something that was overlooked.” Because investigators tend to come and go over the course of years, often there is a dialogue between the former detective assigned to a case and the new one handling it. “We just wait for any new information,” said detective Troy Williams, who has been assigned the Hollingsworth case. “If we get a lead, we’ll follow up on it until we can determine that it’s a bad lead or that it’s going to go somewhere.” Advents in technology have made for better communication among law enforcement across the country. For example, if a body is found, police can cross-reference its DNA with entries in the FBI’s National Crime Information Center, Combined DNA Index System and a number of other resources. “Especially now, if we had a more current missing person, anyone that comes up as a John or Jane Doe as a body being found, I’d be very anxious to find out if that’s my missing person,” Williams said. When the NCIC launched in 1967, its records were not as in depth as today. Now, agencies from all over have access to the same database, making it much easier to find a match with any recovered missing person, Sullivan said. “The DNA within the last 10 years has been at the forefront,” Sullivan said. Anyone with information on any of the unsolved missing-persons cases can call the Fort Smith Police Department’s Criminal Investigation Division at (479) 709-5116, or email missingpersons@fortsmithpd.org. http://swtimes.com/news/special-reports/se...g-persons-cases |
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Ell Only after the last tree has been cut down; Only after the last fish has been caught; Only after the last river has been poisoned; Only then will you realize that money cannot be eaten. | |
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3:42 AM Jul 11