May 24, 2010
ANSWERS STILL DEMANDED
By Tony Rutherford
HNN Writer
Editor's Note: Five years ago Saturday, May 22, 2005, Huntington received a wake up call on drugs and violent crime with four teens dead on Charleston Avenue. Looking back, one law enforcement officer stated at a news conference: The longer the crime goes unsolved, the harder it will be to bring the responsible party ( s ) to justice.
The Charleston Avenue house where the slaughter occurred is now known as Hope House. Huntington has been awarded a federal grant to initiate what has become a very successful Weed and Seed program. Police Chief Skip Holbrook and Mayor Kim Wolfe have placed running drug dealers out of town as one of their first priorities.
As for solutions to the killings? In this story, you will read the theories developed a few days after the shootings. If you have information that would help close this case, call (304) 696-4440.
* * *
Another sad page turns Saturday in Huntington’s history as the bodies of Michael Dillon, 17, and Eddrick Clark, 18, are buried this afternoon. Dillion’s funeral begins at 12:30 at Chapman’s Mortuary, while Clark’s service starts at 1:00 p.m. at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.
As the families complete the ritual, they and Huntington citizens demand answers to the riddle that left Donte Ward, Megan Poston, Dillon and Clark dead in a driveway at 1410 Charleston Avenue of gunshot wounds at 4:30 a.m. Sunday.
The prevailing theory of the H.P.D. remains that a killer or killer(s) targeted Ward and that the three teens happened to be there at the wrong time. They suspect the killers were involved in the drug trade; however, drugs were not necessarily a factor in the shooting.
Perhaps, the hypothesis should be what was the mindset of individual(s) who carried out the shooting of Ward in spite of knowing that it would be witnessed by three innocent teens? What motivated these heartless entities (they aren’t worthy of being called ‘human’) to continue with the plan knowing that three additional lives would have to be taken…could they not have waited until Mr. Ward was alone?
At the Thursday news conference, another theorem of criminal justice was brought up: The longer the crime goes without an arrest, the chances of bringing the offenders to justice shrink.
To shift the odds more to the ‘good guys,’ the F.B.I. has made its Rapid Start data base available. Joe Ciccarelli, a supervisory FBI agent, said the database was also used in the Samantha Burns investigation.
“It’s a computer database that allows investigators to input events as they happen,” Ciccarelli explained. “It will allow supervisory personnel, like Captain Hall, to review information quickly. It can generate time line information, generate documents referring to vehicles referenced in the case, and over time allows any investigator to go back and find out if a certain person has been interviewed, and if they have, what did they say.”
Despite the fact that the dragnet has widened to surrounding states, Capt. Hall on Thursday did not rule out the potential involvement of Allen Baird, a 28-year-old Detroit man known on the streets as “Scratch,” who was being held at the Western Regional Jail for Michigan parole violations. He had been mistakenly released last month. Three correctional officers have been fired due to his “escape” by switching wrist bands with another inmate.
“He’s from Detroit and he escaped from jail,” Hall said. Still, as of Thursday afternoon, according to the detective, “there have been no direct arrests in reference to the murder.”
While the city weeps --- perhaps the most since the 1971 air crash that took the lives of Marshall’s football team and supporters --- and prays for forgiveness and healing, hopefully, the pledges to ‘work together’ will not soon be forgotten. The Tuesday rainbow may have symbolically brought hope or a sign that the four young people were looking down from Heaven, but without cooperation and risks from police professionals, communities, and anyone who may hold a clue to the crime, the deaths of Megan, Donte, Michael and Eddrick will not have reawakened the City of Huntington to its friendly, help your neighbor, safe to walk the streets at night and not lock our doors roots.
(Editor's Note: The prevailing current theory is that a woman, now imprisoned for other crimes, may have ordered a hit on one of the teens for allegedly holding out on payments. That case has not gone to trial.)
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ANSWERS STILL DEMANDED
By Tony Rutherford
HNN Writer
Editor's Note: Five years ago Saturday, May 22, 2005, Huntington received a wake up call on drugs and violent crime with four teens dead on Charleston Avenue. Looking back, one law enforcement officer stated at a news conference: The longer the crime goes unsolved, the harder it will be to bring the responsible party ( s ) to justice.
The Charleston Avenue house where the slaughter occurred is now known as Hope House. Huntington has been awarded a federal grant to initiate what has become a very successful Weed and Seed program. Police Chief Skip Holbrook and Mayor Kim Wolfe have placed running drug dealers out of town as one of their first priorities.
As for solutions to the killings? In this story, you will read the theories developed a few days after the shootings. If you have information that would help close this case, call (304) 696-4440.
* * *
Another sad page turns Saturday in Huntington’s history as the bodies of Michael Dillon, 17, and Eddrick Clark, 18, are buried this afternoon. Dillion’s funeral begins at 12:30 at Chapman’s Mortuary, while Clark’s service starts at 1:00 p.m. at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.
As the families complete the ritual, they and Huntington citizens demand answers to the riddle that left Donte Ward, Megan Poston, Dillon and Clark dead in a driveway at 1410 Charleston Avenue of gunshot wounds at 4:30 a.m. Sunday.
The prevailing theory of the H.P.D. remains that a killer or killer(s) targeted Ward and that the three teens happened to be there at the wrong time. They suspect the killers were involved in the drug trade; however, drugs were not necessarily a factor in the shooting.
Perhaps, the hypothesis should be what was the mindset of individual(s) who carried out the shooting of Ward in spite of knowing that it would be witnessed by three innocent teens? What motivated these heartless entities (they aren’t worthy of being called ‘human’) to continue with the plan knowing that three additional lives would have to be taken…could they not have waited until Mr. Ward was alone?
At the Thursday news conference, another theorem of criminal justice was brought up: The longer the crime goes without an arrest, the chances of bringing the offenders to justice shrink.
To shift the odds more to the ‘good guys,’ the F.B.I. has made its Rapid Start data base available. Joe Ciccarelli, a supervisory FBI agent, said the database was also used in the Samantha Burns investigation.
“It’s a computer database that allows investigators to input events as they happen,” Ciccarelli explained. “It will allow supervisory personnel, like Captain Hall, to review information quickly. It can generate time line information, generate documents referring to vehicles referenced in the case, and over time allows any investigator to go back and find out if a certain person has been interviewed, and if they have, what did they say.”
Despite the fact that the dragnet has widened to surrounding states, Capt. Hall on Thursday did not rule out the potential involvement of Allen Baird, a 28-year-old Detroit man known on the streets as “Scratch,” who was being held at the Western Regional Jail for Michigan parole violations. He had been mistakenly released last month. Three correctional officers have been fired due to his “escape” by switching wrist bands with another inmate.
“He’s from Detroit and he escaped from jail,” Hall said. Still, as of Thursday afternoon, according to the detective, “there have been no direct arrests in reference to the murder.”
While the city weeps --- perhaps the most since the 1971 air crash that took the lives of Marshall’s football team and supporters --- and prays for forgiveness and healing, hopefully, the pledges to ‘work together’ will not soon be forgotten. The Tuesday rainbow may have symbolically brought hope or a sign that the four young people were looking down from Heaven, but without cooperation and risks from police professionals, communities, and anyone who may hold a clue to the crime, the deaths of Megan, Donte, Michael and Eddrick will not have reawakened the City of Huntington to its friendly, help your neighbor, safe to walk the streets at night and not lock our doors roots.
(Editor's Note: The prevailing current theory is that a woman, now imprisoned for other crimes, may have ordered a hit on one of the teens for allegedly holding out on payments. That case has not gone to trial.)
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