Fred Shelton was a sergeant with CPD’s patrol division in 1995 when he joined the department’s newly created community policing team tasked with building better relations and communication lines with citizens.
He didn’t realize at the time the trial by fire for which he and his four team members had signed on.
Between July 1996 and November 1998, five victims, all older than 60, were stabbed, strangled — or both — to death in their homes. The cases remain unsolved, and none even rendered a true break until this week when authorities arrested a suspect in the death of 71-year-old Mack Fowler, the first of the five cold-case victims.
U.S. Marshals picked up 52-year-old David Murray in Jackson Tuesday after DNA evidence from Fowler’s unsolved murder pinged a match with Murray in the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System. Murray arrived in Columbus Tuesday where he was charged with capital murder and is being held without bond in the Lowndes County Adult Detention Center.
It was the first time Pete Bowen, CPD chief at the time of Fowler’s death, had heard of Murray, who wasn’t considered as a suspect in the ’90s when the investigation into Fowler’s case first opened.
“Mr. Fowler was the type of person who had a lot of people in his house,” Bowen said. “It was a difficult case because of the number of people who did come and go from his house.”
Following Fowler’s death, George Wilbanks, 70, was found stabbed and strangled in his home on Nov. 2, 1997.
In 1998, very similar killings in less than six weeks claimed the lives of three north Columbus residents that lived in a three-mile radius. Robert Hannah, 61, was found in his home after a fire on Oct. 13. According to previous Dispatch reports, he was found bound, gagged and strangled, and investigators at the time believed the fire was set to hide evidence of the murder.
Louise Randall, 61, was found bound, gagged and strangled in her home on Oct. 20. Sixty-seven year-old Betty Everett was killed the same way on Nov. 17.
City on high alert
By the time of the last three deaths, Columbus was on high alert. Shelton said as each murder investigation opened, citizens became increasingly concerned, even afraid, of what was happening in their city.
A rewards program offering $20,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a suspect produced tips that never materialized. City leadership hosted town hall meetings allowing citizens to vent their concerns, and an influx of Columbus residents wanted to be prepared to protect themselves if an at-large murderer appeared at their address.
“We had a lot of people who wanted to arm themselves and take gun classes,” recalled Shelton, who is now CPD’s assistant chief. “We facilitated that by making our gun range available to citizens because we wanted to make sure they knew how to handle the guns safely.”
Friends and neighbors of the victims expressed shock at the killings, police officials advised the public in newspaper articles on how to stay safe in their homes, and more than 200 people showed up to a Nov. 24, 1998, town hall meeting to address the killings at the Trotter Convention Center. Even more people watched the televised meeting in their homes or other places around town.
“What’s the benefit?” Columbus resident Vanessa Jones said to a Dispatch reporter as they watched the meeting on television at a local laundromat. “We’re discussing five people who are dead. The murderer is sitting in front of the TV, laughing and figuring out his next victim. That’s exactly what he’s doing.”
Jackie Ball, a former city councilman, remarked during a council meeting the morning of Everett’s murder that Jackson was “the only place worse than Columbus, Mississippi.”
The case even made national headlines. The New York Times ran an article on the murders in December 1998, and the case made episodes of both “48 Hours” on CBS and “Dark Minds” on the Discovery Network.
Bowen, who had retired by then but still recalled the atmosphere, said the city was tense with fear after the murders.
“It was very concerning, to everyone, that we had these old people killed and no one in jail for it,” Bowen said.
Despite the timing and close vicinity of the killings, Bowen said he never believed Fowler’s death was directly related to any of the others.
“It was a very violent crime,” Bowen said. “I never did, and I don’t think any of the investigators who worked on it, think it was connected to the others. It was a different M.O. I always felt someone got very angry or personal with him — not a serial killer or anything like that.”
Something positive
With each death, Shelton said he wanted to press harder to find the perpetrators, while working simultaneously to help a community gripped with fear find its feet.
For the next 20 years, little of note happened to satisfy the former. But he believes he and his community policing team made significant headway on the latter goal, laying a foundation for programs and organizations that are still making an impact and bringing about something positive from a horrible situation.
“That was really our first go at it, and we emphasized programs like Neighborhood Watch and National Night Out (with law enforcement),” he said. “And there were community groups formed back then that are still functioning to this day. Starting where we were and seeing where we are now, I’d have to say the (community policing element) was a success. All we have to do is keep building on it.”
Regardless of whether the late ’90s murders are connected, Shelton called this week’s cold-case break encouraging.
“It gives me hope the rest of them can be solved,” he said. “It tells me there must be some information out there that can help us.”
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