Who Savagely Gunned Down Mother Of Three, Candance Prunty?

Candance M."Pooky" Prunty

She was smart, fun loving, bubbly. She was a hard worker and loved her family, especially her three kids. She also loved people, food and taking naps. Candance loved to laugh and had the most beautiful, brightest smile.

Candance was born on October 4th, 1989 to Patricia Beard and Howard Prunty. She graduated in 2008 from South High School. She also received a certificate of completion in Business Office Administration from Clark State Community College 2015.

On Wednesday, October 21st, 2015, while her boys were at school, someone came into her house on the 1000 block of West Mulberry Street in Springfield, Ohio and shot 24-year-old Candance to death. It was just before 4 p.m. when family went to the home to check on her because she had not picked her children up from school. They found the back door unlocked and Candance laying on the kitchen floor. She had been shot in the arm and neck area.

The family then called police.

Sometime before her murder, her car was vandalized followed by her home. Candance had moved from her home on Wittenberg Avenue, into the West Mulberry home with her older sister before the murder. Candance had been harassed at the previous home by someone throwing boulders through her windows.

In the following days after her murder, there was a person of interest taken into custody by Columbus SWAT teams, but they were never charged. 

The police believed that the arrest of the person of interest would lead them other people. 

Candance's mother believes people in the area have information that could be useful to the case and she wants them to come forward.

Time Was Wasted Thinking That Barbara Cotton Was A Run Away, Now It Is Believed That She Was Abducted.

Barbara Louise Cotton

She was a very beautiful, sweet girl. She was shy to those she didn't know, but fun and full of laughter with those she did.

Barbara was born on November 10th, 1965 in North Dakota. 

She was 15-years old and worked part time at the Country Kitchen restaurant in 1981, and attended Williston High School. Barbara was last seen leaving a restaurant on Main Street in her hometown of Williston, North Dakota during the evening hours of April 11th. She had dinner there with her mother and her boyfriend. Her boyfriend offered to accompany her home afterwards, but she declined and left the restaurant alone. Her boyfriend saw her walk from the Plainsman building to Reclamation Park where she had five blocks left to her home. Her path home that night would have led her on Main Street up Fifth Street and Sixth Avenue West.

Barbara never arrived at her destination and has never been heard from again. She did not take her clothes, eyeglasses, cigarettes, money, or any other personal belongings with her when she disappeared. She also left behind a paycheck from work. Her younger brother stated he was very close to Barbara and she never told him of any plans to leave home.

Sandy Evanson, then 17 years old, was a childhood friend of Barbara's and remembers the night she went missing. Evanson thought that there was no way Cotton had run away, since she left her money, cigarettes and clothing at home.

Evanson recalled that Barbara's mother called late that night wondering if Evanson had heard from Barbara. Her mother told Evanson that after having dinner with Barbara and her boyfriend, the mother left. Her boyfriend had offered to walk Barbara home, but she declined and walked home alone.

The next day, Cotton's sister Kathy and brother Kent walked the path Cotton would have taken home, looking for clues and asking residents who lived on those streets if they had heard or seen anything.

Barbara was originally investigated as a runaway case and a missing persons report was not filed for several days as a result.

Authorities now believe that she may have been abducted, but the prime suspect in her disappearance, a former boyfriend of Barbara's, is now deceased. Her case is considered open and unsolved.

At the time of her disappearance, Barbara was 5'2" tall, 100 pounds with brown hair and hazel eyes. She was last seen wearing a blouse, jeans and loafers. Barbara's ears were pierced, and her left ear was slightly lower than her right ear. She had a dark brown mole on the upper right side of her chest. Barbara had a pronounced "S" curve in her spine, which caused her to walk with a slight limp. She smoked cigarettes in 1981. Barbara wore eyeglasses, but left hers behind when she disappeared. Her teeth were in excellent condition at the time of her disappearance.

Those with information are urged to call the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678 or the Williston Police Department Missing Persons Unit at 701-577-1212.

The Whole Town Thought That Reesa Trexler's Sister Killed Her. This Last Year The Truth Came To Light.

Reesa Dawn Trexler

"An Angel On Earth, Now One In Heaven."

She had a heart of gold. She never met a stranger and was always willing to help people.

Reesa was born on October 11th, 1968 in Rowan County, North Carolina to Vickie Oaks.

On June 15th, 1984, 15-year-old Reesa lived next door to her grandparents. She went to visit them on 714 North Shaver Street in Salisbury, while her sister Jodi stayed home. Reesa didn't realize her grandfather had gone grocery shopping while her grandmother was at a hair appointment. 

An hour or so later Jodie heard an blood curdling scream. She ran to her bedroom window and looked across to her grandparents’ home to see her grandfather screaming and clenching his fists so hard that his knuckles had turned white. She ran next door, into the house and up the stairs and pushed open the bedroom door.

The room was completely covered in red.

Jodie looked down to see a heap covered in a blanket that was heavily saturated in blood. As she looked closer she could see skin and hair. It was Reesa, she was nude and had been stabbed several times in the upper chest and neck. An autopsy showed the blade of a knife had broken off and was found in her right shoulder. It also showed that she had been raped.

In total there was 18 stab wounds to the girl’s upper body, the volume of injuries painted a picture of an attacker stabbing away at the teen in a fit of rage. There was no indication that someone had forced their way into the property, nor had anything of value been taken from the home. Reesa was still wearing her jewelry.

Police semen and was described as a single African American hair was found on the body.  5 eyewitness reported seeing a black male running in the area around the time of the crime. Despite all of this, no suspect was found.

Jodie, then 13 years old became a suspect in her sister's murder and was shunned by the town. She was interrogated by police without the presence of her parents and asked multiple times if she had killed Reesa.

Eventually, in an attempt to clear her name, Jodi appeared on the Dr. Phil show in 2018 where she took and passed a polygraph test. Her appearance on the show renewed interest in the case and the 35 year old DNA samples collected from the crime scene were sent off to a lab and a suspect was soon narrowed down with the aid of genetic genealogy databases. And the murderer was identified. 

Curtis Edward Blair Sr. was 40-years-old at the time of Reesa's murder. He lived in the area and worked for a Frito-lay facility that was within a few blocks of the Trexler home. He died in California in August, 2004, of acute ventricular failure and congestive heart failure. He was exhumed in June of last year and that DNA was collected.

Reesa's family thought that they'd never seen this day come. And even thought it doesn't bring her back, her family is glad that they finally know who stole Reesa's life. And Jody is happy that her name had finally been cleared.

Some Stuff That Happened On January 1st.

January 1st In..

1776- General George Washington ordered the Grand Union Flag to be hoisted on a 76 foot tall pole, on a hill in Somerville, just outside of Boston. The Grand Union flag was created during the first year of the Revolutionary War. The designer and exact date of creation are unknown, but it is credited as the first national flag of the United States. It was an important signal that indicated increasing separation from the British.

1861- Lincoln issued the final Emancipation Proclamation. It would only apply to the Confederate States, as an act to seize enemy resources. By freeing slaves in the Confederacy, Lincoln was actually freeing people he did not directly control. He emphasized emancipation as a way to shorten the Civil War by taking Southern resources and hence reducing Confederate strength.  Lincoln made no such offer of freedom to the border states.

1880- Building of the Panama Canal begins. It is an artificial 82 km waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama. Before the canal was built, ships traveling between the east and west coasts of North America had to go all the way around South America.

1886- 1st Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California. It's a celebration that's more than a century old--a festival of flowers, music and sports unequaled anywhere in the world. The Tournament is more than just a parade and football game. It's America's New Year Celebration, a greeting to the world on the first day of the year, and a salute to the community spirit and love of pageantry in Pasadena.

1892 - Ellis Island becomes reception center for new immigrants to the United States. It was active until 1954. The federal government wanted to take control of immigration so it could make sure that immigrants didn't have diseases and were able to support themselves once they arrived in the country.

Hunting A Cop Killer: The Robert Bolden Murder

Robert Bolden

He was always right where you needed him. Gentleman of a cop and a really swell guy. He loved being in uniform.

He had been born and raised in South Carolina, and his family members were once sharecroppers on a plantation owned by the Pratt family called Good Hope.

He enlisted in the Navy after the attacks on Pearl Harbor. He was only 16, but lied about his age. When he came home from the war, he settled in New York City and married a lady who lived in Brooklyn. He first found work with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s police unit before joining the Police Department in 1955. Where he worked in the 75th Precinct in East Brooklyn.

On Friday, January 22nd, 1971, Officer Bolden lived in the Farragut Houses, a public-housing project, with his wife and three kids. On his way home from work, 45-year-old Officer Bolden had stopped into Dunne’s Bar and Grill on Gold Street.. He was chatting with his friend and bartender, John Gallagher. The bar was unusually empty that night. Officer Bolden, Gallagher and a third man in the phone booth, were the only ones in the bar. 

It was around 10 p.m. when Mr. Gallagher decided that he was going to close the bar early. He asked Officer Bolden, who was not in uniform, to tell the man in the phone booth that the bar was closing. Officer Bolden went over, rapped on the phone booth door and said the place was closing.  When he returned to the bar, the man emerged from the booth with a shotgun. He fired and wounded Officer Bolden, who returned fire with his service revolver, his bullets missing their mark and slamming into the wood bar. The man fired again, this time killing Officer Bolden where he stood. He fell to the floor.

The gunman ran out of the bar. Moments later, two other men ran in, grabbed the officer’s revolver, and ran back out. Witnesses told the police the men fled in a different direction than the first man.

Behind the bar, Mr. Gallagher blacked out.

A police helicopter searched in vain for the shooter. Officers contacted people who had received calls from the pay phone that night, but none were believed to have spoken to him.

The bartender was interrogated and passed a lie-detector test, leaving detectives convinced he had nothing to do with the crime. He died a few years later.

In the days after the murder, the police thought they were close to an arrest. Two people outside the bar that night had said they saw a man leaving Dunne’s near the time of the shooting. But the man came forward to the police when he learned detectives were looking for him and brought five witnesses who said he was with them that night, nowhere near Dunne’s. A grand jury declined to indict him.

There was a lead about a serial killer incarcerated in another state that had traveled through town around the time that Officer Bolden was murdered.

There are rumors that Officer Bolden was shot over a woman and that a lot of things get covered up in that particular neighborhood because people are afraid.

Motivated by the death of his uncle, Gregory W. Bolden of Providence, R.I., joined his local police department. He died in 2005 of a rare illness. That same year, one of Officer Bolden’s grandchildren, John Bolden, joined the New York Police Department, starting at the same precinct where the grandfather he never met lived and lost his life. He too was inspired by Officer Bolden.

“I never met my grandfather but he is the reason I became a cop,” he said.

The department is offering a record $111,500 reward for information leading to the arrest of the coward that killed Officer Bolden.

Anyone with information about Bolden’s death should call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-8477 (TIPS).

No One Really Wants Arthur Rochford Manby's Murder Solved.

Arthur Rochford Manby

He was an imperialist who dressed in expensive clothing. He thought of the wilderness as an empire that he believed he was destined to rule. Manby had a brilliant mind, refined taste, and an appreciation of the visual beauty of the Taos Valley. He also was devious, calculating, greedy, manipulating, persistent, and a murderer. In short, he was a loner, and had few if any friends.

He was born July 14th , 1859 to Emily Norton and the Reverend Edward Francis Manby in the village of Poulton-le-Sands, in Lancashire, England. Arthur was the eighth of nine siblings. He went to Belfast for schooling, where he studied architecture and mineralogy. Arthur was also a talented watercolorist

A ambitious 24-year-old Arthur migrated from England to the United States in 1883 via boat. He then took a train to Raton New Mexico, where began ranching and mining with his two brothers, Jocelyn and Alfred. They built their ranch at Castle Rock, later to be determined that it was on the Maxwell Land Grant. He established several land companies, including the Taos Land Company and the Colonial Bond and Security Company, both in New Mexico. He did this by conning, stealing, lying, begging, and bribing both Native Americans and Spanish families.

Manby’s goal was to acquire the vast Antonio Martinez Land Grant (61,605.48 acres) near Taos. He obtained the Antonio Martinez land grant in 1913. This included the hot springs on the Rio Grande, today named Manby Hot Springs. It was his plan to build a grand hotel and gardens at the hot springs. However, Manby used investors’ money to improve his personal estate rather than to make improvements to land grant properties. 

Within 3 years, the Land Grant was sold at public auction as a result of Manby’s accumulation of debt. He retained the 23 acres of land that included his hacienda and surrounding gardens.

Manby tried to entice multi-millionaire Dr. Victor C. Thorne of New York, to pay accumulating debts. He also formed the “United States Civil Secret Service Society”, the purpose of which was to fleece its members of large sums of money. 

In December of 1919, Mable Dodge Stern and her husband Maurice Stern appeared at Manby’s front door and asked to rent his home, to which he agreed. A friendship of sorts developed between Mabel and Manby. However, Mabel became wary of Manby and moved out.

In 1929, a US Deputy from Santa Fe tried to serve legal papers related to a lawsuit to Manby. When no one answered, the Deputy went to the courthouse in Taos Plaza and asked the Taos Deputy Sheriff, his brother, if anyone had seen Manby. The Taos Deputy Sheriff was told that Manby was likely dead because of flies swarming on his screen door. The end result was that these two law officers plus others who appeared at Manby’s residence found his body in one of the front rooms of the house, and his head in the adjoining room along with his German police dog. It was rapidly concluded that Manby died of natural causes, with the assumption that the dog had chewed off Manby’s head.

Some people, including his family, weren't sure it was truly Manby's body. So, in late August of 1929, his body was exhumed. Manby’s dentist, a blacksmith, a detective sent by the Federal government, and Doc Martin concluded that the body was indeed that of Manby, identifying his dentures and jewelry,  that he had been shot numerous times in the chest and face, and that his head had been severed from his body with a sharp object. 

A set of presumably Manby’s dentures were found at Manby’s bedside by a private detective hired by the Attorney General of New Mexico ~ July 9th, 1929, and the dentist who identified Manby’s body by his dentures in August later recanted his story. Doc Martin destroyed his autopsy results because the state never paid him. And, there were reports that Manby was seen both in Mexico and Italy after his “death”.

Nobody in the community wanted the murder solved, believing that the death of Manby was itself the ultimate justice. And in 1930 the case was dropped.