Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Now the Violence in the Valley podcast with retired Parkersburg
Chief of Police Bob Newell and others. Brought to you
by Interstate Insurance three generations of insurance Excellence.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
The Washington County Cold Case Unit has shown exceptional levels
of success over the years. The unit was formerly organized
by the Sheriff's Department and was comprised of various law
enforcement personnel for the Marietta Police Department, a High Bureau
of Criminal Investigation, Washington County Prosecutor's Office, and the oh
Attorney General's Office. But before the cold Case Unit was established,
(00:47):
investigators were digging into cases dating back to the nineteen seventies.
The first unsolved murder that haunted the county was that
of a nine year old girl named Anna Marie Brown.
She had been strangled and her body was dumped a
few hundred yards away from when she disappeared near her
home in a trailer park. Here's Cold Case Detective Lieutenant
Jeff Severs of Washington County Sherifes Department.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
I actually worked some cold cases before this even started,
and we had a nineteen seventy five murder of that
Anna Marie Brown.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Several suspects had been named in the murder of Anna Marie.
Her body was found near a trailer of a known
pedophile and another person of interests lived in the same
trailer park, both of whom cooperated with police and passed
the light detective test, But deputies were also focusing on
the girl's uncle, Carol Brown, who was the last person
to be seen with her by several witnesses just minutes
(01:37):
before she disappeared. Again, here's cold case, Detective Lieutenant Jeff Severs.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
The uncle is the one who we arrested, but there
was a technicality and he was released shortly after and
then I think had he had a heart attack almost
soon after he got released, and he ended up dying.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Carol Brown was arrested in nineteen ninety seven, over two
decades after the murder. Police basically had the same information
as they possessed shortly after the murder, but had reinterviewed
witnesses to shore up the case. One of those witnesses
claimed the uncle had confessed to her years earlier and
had told investigators in the late nineteen seventies. Attorneys for
Brown appealed this indictment to the o High State Supreme Court.
(02:21):
They claimed that there was an unreasonable delay in bringing
the indictment, which caused undue prejudice to their client. The
Supreme Court agreed the prosecutor had no more evidence twenty
two years later than they did in the nineteen seventies,
and therefore they dismissed the indictment. In nineteen eighty four,
eight years after Brown was murdered, thirteen year old Elizabeth
Leith of Burkhammer accepted a ride from the family friend
(02:44):
after a sporting event on the last day she was
seen alive.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Lisa Burkhammer was playing. She was at the softball field
on the west side of Marietta and he just happened
to be driving by and got her into the vehicle
and then he ended up driving her out to the
cemetery and Lower Salem and that's where she was murdered.
And back in that time.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
That was.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Like the mid nineties, and we worked that case and
that's when our crime scene unit we were really in
a lot of training and stuff. And then we had
just bought an alternate light source. We were on maybe
the only two agencies of state Ohio that had that,
and we did some training. So we myself and was
(03:29):
detective Brian Shook. We located our suspect, which was Dale Sparks,
and we interviewed him in Charleston, West Virginia, and after
several hours he confessed and then he agreed to take
us where her body was, and so we went out.
He took us out to the Lower Lower Salem Cemetery
(03:51):
and by this time, it's like two in the morning,
and we've been going for like twenty four straight hours,
and he just pointed to the wooded area, said, she's
out there somewhere, but that's where that's where it happened.
And so I can remember. We we we brought an
RV out because we thought we'd be out there for weeks,
you know, trying to locate the body. And we brought
(04:15):
in doctor Piles from West Virginia University, and he was
he we called him doctor dig because he specialized in
recovery of bodies and bones and stuff. So we're out
there and we got he's got these tools that we're
going to use, and we spent several wawers gridding off
fifty by fifty foot gridge, you know, for sevil acres.
(04:37):
And we're standing there and he's demonstrating how to use
these tools and he goes, well, that's her right there,
and we were standing almost right on top of her.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Years later, the suspect told deputies at Lisa had fallen
hit her head on a rock and that the death
was accidental. But a forensic examination he's in an alternative
light source found ribness of the victims underwear clutched in
her hand, telling a different store.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
So we took what we was able to find using
that light source, and the guys did an excellent job
on the crime scene. Went back to him the next
day and confronting with it, and he changed his story
and told us a little bit more because, as you're aware,
most people will minimize even when they confess, and he
tried to minimize. You know, it was an accident and whatnot,
but we strongly believed there was a sexual assault involved,
(05:24):
and that's exactly what happened.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
These cases trained resources as deputies were also investigating the
nineteen eighty one unsolved murder of Lieutenant Joe Clark, which
was ongoing throughout the same period of time. As these
investigations stalled. The nineteen nineties brought a nui sense of
fear that a serial killer might be on the loose
in Washington County when three more young women became the
victims of murder, all of which would go unsolved. The
(05:48):
first of these cases with a discovery of eighteen year
old Terry Roach, who had just recently graduated from Belbury
High School. Roach's body was found a few days after
being reported missing by her family in the summer of nightteen.
A few days after Roach had gone missing, a man
walking along the ride away looking for Barry's just outside
of Belbury would find her badly beaten body along the way.
(06:09):
Terry had moved away from her parents since a few
days before, so there was a lapse of several days
before she was reported to the police. Now as an adult,
she was able to come and go she pleased, including
frequenting nightclubs. At the end of the Belbi Bridge, spending
the Ohio River into Parkersburg, West Virginia, stood a couple
of bars that were convenient to walk to for a
Belpie resident. Stevers was a uniformed deputy at the time,
(06:32):
and the crime was initially invested by senior deputies who
interviewed hundreds of people.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Through the investigation, we got several people had seen her
around town up until July fifth, and I think that's
the last that we got documentation on anybody seeing her alive.
It wasn't unusual for her to hitchhike and be out
at all the nights of the hour, walking the streets
(06:58):
of parker or spy Bealpy. We do have information that
she was at a bar or in Parkersburg somewhere in
this time frame.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
It is an aery coincidence that these Parkersburg locations would
later play into the night Passy Sparks disappeared two years later,
and now more recently, the night Gretchen Fleming would accept
her last ride from a bar patron, never to be
seen again. A couple of years after the Roach murder,
eighteen year old Ronda Manley was raped and stabbed to
death an oak growth cemetery in Marietta, Ohio. Her body
(07:30):
was found just off a pathway, lying among tombstones. Manly
had been stabbed multiple times. Her case would be solved
years later by a tip given to law enforcement, eventually
the matching of DNA through the national database. However, at
the time of the murders, the three cases differed from
each other. Roach had been beaten and possibly strangled. Patsy's
Sparks's body had not yet been found, and Manly had
(07:52):
been stabbed, so it was difficult to conclude that the
same person had committed all the murders, but similarities are
not always present serial killer. It is not as important
how the serial killer murders as it is why they
murdered their victim.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
If you were to look at it as an investigator,
you take all those unsolves back then you would have
thought we had a serial killer. The only thing with
the Terry Roach is her injuries are extremely consistent with
the injuries that Patsy Sparks had.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Several similarities stand out between Terry Roach and Patsy Sparks.
Both were high risk victims, Both were young, unaccompanied females
out late at night who frequented night spots where sexual
predators often are found, and both were severely beaten before
their deaths. The killer of Patsy Sparks was eventually arrested
and convicted of her murder after a body was discovered
(08:40):
by hunters in another county. The suspect, Randy Slider, had
already been convicted of multiple rapes and served time in prison.
After this conviction, several young women came forward describing the
night they accepted a ride from Slider and were then
beaten and raped. Slider had denied killing Terry Roach, leaving
this as the last remaining unsolved case. If anyone has
(09:00):
information about this case, you can contact the Warhton County
Shar's Office Cold Case Unit, or any law enforcement agency.
I want to again thank Cold Case Detective Lieutenant Jeff Severs.
Please share this series with friends and family on the
iHeart app or wherever you get your podcast.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
The Violence in the Valley podcast has been brought to
you by Interstate Insurance three generations of insurance Excellence. For
even more details, get a copy of the book at
Amazon dot com.
Now the Violence in the Valley podcast with retired Parkersburg
Chief of Police Bob Newell and others. Brought to you
by Interstate Insurance three generations of insurance Excellence.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
The Washington County Cold Case Unit has shown exceptional levels
of success over the years. The unit was formerly organized
by the Sheriff's Department and was comprised of various law
enforcement personnel for the Marietta Police Department, a High Bureau
of Criminal Investigation, Washington County Prosecutor's Office, and the oh
Attorney General's Office. But before the cold Case Unit was established,
(00:47):
investigators were digging into cases dating back to the nineteen seventies.
The first unsolved murder that haunted the county was that
of a nine year old girl named Anna Marie Brown.
She had been strangled and her body was dumped a
few hundred yards away from when she disappeared near her
home in a trailer park. Here's Cold Case Detective Lieutenant
Jeff Severs of Washington County Sherifes Department.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
I actually worked some cold cases before this even started,
and we had a nineteen seventy five murder of that
Anna Marie Brown.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Several suspects had been named in the murder of Anna Marie.
Her body was found near a trailer of a known
pedophile and another person of interests lived in the same
trailer park, both of whom cooperated with police and passed
the light detective test, But deputies were also focusing on
the girl's uncle, Carol Brown, who was the last person
to be seen with her by several witnesses just minutes
(01:37):
before she disappeared. Again, here's cold case, Detective Lieutenant Jeff Severs.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
The uncle is the one who we arrested, but there
was a technicality and he was released shortly after and
then I think had he had a heart attack almost
soon after he got released, and he ended up dying.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Carol Brown was arrested in nineteen ninety seven, over two
decades after the murder. Police basically had the same information
as they possessed shortly after the murder, but had reinterviewed
witnesses to shore up the case. One of those witnesses
claimed the uncle had confessed to her years earlier and
had told investigators in the late nineteen seventies. Attorneys for
Brown appealed this indictment to the o High State Supreme Court.
(02:21):
They claimed that there was an unreasonable delay in bringing
the indictment, which caused undue prejudice to their client. The
Supreme Court agreed the prosecutor had no more evidence twenty
two years later than they did in the nineteen seventies,
and therefore they dismissed the indictment. In nineteen eighty four,
eight years after Brown was murdered, thirteen year old Elizabeth
Leith of Burkhammer accepted a ride from the family friend
(02:44):
after a sporting event on the last day she was
seen alive.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Lisa Burkhammer was playing. She was at the softball field
on the west side of Marietta and he just happened
to be driving by and got her into the vehicle
and then he ended up driving her out to the
cemetery and Lower Salem and that's where she was murdered.
And back in that time.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
That was.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Like the mid nineties, and we worked that case and
that's when our crime scene unit we were really in
a lot of training and stuff. And then we had
just bought an alternate light source. We were on maybe
the only two agencies of state Ohio that had that,
and we did some training. So we myself and was
(03:29):
detective Brian Shook. We located our suspect, which was Dale Sparks,
and we interviewed him in Charleston, West Virginia, and after
several hours he confessed and then he agreed to take
us where her body was, and so we went out.
He took us out to the Lower Lower Salem Cemetery
(03:51):
and by this time, it's like two in the morning,
and we've been going for like twenty four straight hours,
and he just pointed to the wooded area, said, she's
out there somewhere, but that's where that's where it happened.
And so I can remember. We we we brought an
RV out because we thought we'd be out there for weeks,
you know, trying to locate the body. And we brought
(04:15):
in doctor Piles from West Virginia University, and he was
he we called him doctor dig because he specialized in
recovery of bodies and bones and stuff. So we're out
there and we got he's got these tools that we're
going to use, and we spent several wawers gridding off
fifty by fifty foot gridge, you know, for sevil acres.
(04:37):
And we're standing there and he's demonstrating how to use
these tools and he goes, well, that's her right there,
and we were standing almost right on top of her.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Years later, the suspect told deputies at Lisa had fallen
hit her head on a rock and that the death
was accidental. But a forensic examination he's in an alternative
light source found ribness of the victims underwear clutched in
her hand, telling a different store.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
So we took what we was able to find using
that light source, and the guys did an excellent job
on the crime scene. Went back to him the next
day and confronting with it, and he changed his story
and told us a little bit more because, as you're aware,
most people will minimize even when they confess, and he
tried to minimize. You know, it was an accident and whatnot,
but we strongly believed there was a sexual assault involved,
(05:24):
and that's exactly what happened.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
These cases trained resources as deputies were also investigating the
nineteen eighty one unsolved murder of Lieutenant Joe Clark, which
was ongoing throughout the same period of time. As these
investigations stalled. The nineteen nineties brought a nui sense of
fear that a serial killer might be on the loose
in Washington County when three more young women became the
victims of murder, all of which would go unsolved. The
(05:48):
first of these cases with a discovery of eighteen year
old Terry Roach, who had just recently graduated from Belbury
High School. Roach's body was found a few days after
being reported missing by her family in the summer of nightteen.
A few days after Roach had gone missing, a man
walking along the ride away looking for Barry's just outside
of Belbury would find her badly beaten body along the way.
(06:09):
Terry had moved away from her parents since a few
days before, so there was a lapse of several days
before she was reported to the police. Now as an adult,
she was able to come and go she pleased, including
frequenting nightclubs. At the end of the Belbi Bridge, spending
the Ohio River into Parkersburg, West Virginia, stood a couple
of bars that were convenient to walk to for a
Belpie resident. Stevers was a uniformed deputy at the time,
(06:32):
and the crime was initially invested by senior deputies who
interviewed hundreds of people.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Through the investigation, we got several people had seen her
around town up until July fifth, and I think that's
the last that we got documentation on anybody seeing her alive.
It wasn't unusual for her to hitchhike and be out
at all the nights of the hour, walking the streets
(06:58):
of parker or spy Bealpy. We do have information that
she was at a bar or in Parkersburg somewhere in
this time frame.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
It is an aery coincidence that these Parkersburg locations would
later play into the night Passy Sparks disappeared two years later,
and now more recently, the night Gretchen Fleming would accept
her last ride from a bar patron, never to be
seen again. A couple of years after the Roach murder,
eighteen year old Ronda Manley was raped and stabbed to
death an oak growth cemetery in Marietta, Ohio. Her body
(07:30):
was found just off a pathway, lying among tombstones. Manly
had been stabbed multiple times. Her case would be solved
years later by a tip given to law enforcement, eventually
the matching of DNA through the national database. However, at
the time of the murders, the three cases differed from
each other. Roach had been beaten and possibly strangled. Patsy's
Sparks's body had not yet been found, and Manly had
(07:52):
been stabbed, so it was difficult to conclude that the
same person had committed all the murders, but similarities are
not always present serial killer. It is not as important
how the serial killer murders as it is why they
murdered their victim.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
If you were to look at it as an investigator,
you take all those unsolves back then you would have
thought we had a serial killer. The only thing with
the Terry Roach is her injuries are extremely consistent with
the injuries that Patsy Sparks had.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Several similarities stand out between Terry Roach and Patsy Sparks.
Both were high risk victims, Both were young, unaccompanied females
out late at night who frequented night spots where sexual
predators often are found, and both were severely beaten before
their deaths. The killer of Patsy Sparks was eventually arrested
and convicted of her murder after a body was discovered
(08:40):
by hunters in another county. The suspect, Randy Slider, had
already been convicted of multiple rapes and served time in prison.
After this conviction, several young women came forward describing the
night they accepted a ride from Slider and were then
beaten and raped. Slider had denied killing Terry Roach, leaving
this as the last remaining unsolved case. If anyone has
(09:00):
information about this case, you can contact the Warhton County
Shar's Office Cold Case Unit, or any law enforcement agency.
I want to again thank Cold Case Detective Lieutenant Jeff Severs.
Please share this series with friends and family on the
iHeart app or wherever you get your podcast.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
The Violence in the Valley podcast has been brought to
you by Interstate Insurance three generations of insurance Excellence. For
even more details, get a copy of the book at
Amazon dot com.
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