Posted on 04/30/2008 12:51:36 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A young Ozarks woman was brutally killed 26-years-ago. Her killer was free for decades. Now her murder mystery may be solved due to DNA but detectives weren't the only people cracking open the cold case.
Twenty-one-year-old Judy Spencer posed in a picture with the man she wanted to marry 26 years ago just before her death. “At the time she was dating him we thought he was too old for her," said her sister Jeanne Paris. Donald “Doc” Nash was almost twice Spencer's age but her family decided to support her. They say they now regret that. “Meeting him was the biggest mistake she ever made," Paris said.
The family never realized less than one year into Nash's courtship of their baby sister that they'd never see him or her again. "I remember where I was standing when I found out. I dropped to the floor," Paris said. The family remembers everything about the day Spencer's body was found in the hole made for an old torn down outhouse.
The grass is still brown around the spot where Spencer's partially nude body was dumped. "To know what happened here is overwhelming," Paris said walking on that same patch of grass. Spencer was strangled with her shoelace and shot in the neck with a shotgun. “She was looking forward to having a family of her own with a white picket fence," Paris said. Instead her clothing was found on a fence near her body off Highway 32 near the Old Bethlehem School. “We believe it was jealousy, rage, anger. Nobody could've done what was done to her without all of that inside of them,” said Spencer’s sister-in-law Darla Spencer.
Two farmers followed drag marks from Spencer's heels to the spot where she was buried under brush. "Small towns have these spots were everybody goes and I think that's what this was back then," Paris said. Spencer’s family always suspected her fiancé “Doc” Nash was responsible but police never found the shotgun or made any arrests. "I just didn't understand why. Why can't they solve this? There's no such thing as a perfect murder," said Spencer
The years passed, newspaper headlines mentioned new tips from time to time but still no arrests. No charges. "I've contacted him from time to time to keep the point sharp to remind him of who we are, who Judy was," Paris said.
Every year the family would post poems reminding the killer, community and law enforcement they still wanted answers. Twenty-six-years later they got the call they'd been waiting for. Both women say they can’t describe their reactions. "Wow. I mean wow," Paris said. They say they finally got the information they'd wanted for more than two decades. "My dad always said when God is ready for us to know. We'll know. I think God's decided,” Paris said. The family says they believe God's plan included a classroom full of strangers and a conversation inside the prison in Licking, Missouri
"She goes ‘my sister in law was murdered 25 years ago and nothings ever come of it," said Southwest Missouri Correctional Facilities Warden Michael Bowersox. Judy Spencer's sister-in-law, Darla, works for Bowersox at the prison. Bowersox is not only a warden in Licking, he also teaches forensic science at Drury University's Cabool campus. "I said do you think the family would mind if I used this as a case study," Bowersox said.
The case study became a project for his students. They took a new look at the evidence in Spencer's murder. "We did the 5 W’s. The who, what, when, where and why. We were going over things with a fine tooth comb," said student Carrie Guillians. About 20 Drury University students cared so much they became obsessed with Spencer's case. "A lot of late nights with us getting together highlighting the cases,” said student Ronda Baker. "A lot of reading, a lot of thinking and retracing police steps," Bowersox said. They did interviews with people who were interviewed back then, plus some additional individuals. The class even went back to the crime scene to map out Spencer's final moments. "We each theorized on our own and we weren't allowed to persuade each other," Guillians said. Each student came up with a list of 5 to 6 people they thought were involved based on the evidence. "They suggested that police look at it and then we passed it along to the family," said Bowersox. At the top of almost every student's list was “Doc” Nash, the man the family had longed suspected. "Pretty much the same things we'd been told for years," Spencer said.
The family says the new attention to a 26-year-old case may have been the break they had been waiting for. "It put a little pressure on law enforcement," Spencer said. In March, authorities arrested Nash and charged him with killing Judy Spencer. Tests not around in 1982 show Nash's DNA under Spencer's fingernails. Police say that finding suggests a struggle. "For whatever reason she got that DNA under her fingernails," said Paris. "I was just flabbergasted. I was just speechless," Bowersox said.
The Missouri Highway Patrol isn't crediting Bowersox's class with breaking the case. The class says they don’t need it. They say the patrol and DNA made the arrest possible. “The credit goes to 2-3 individuals who've been fighting this battle for 25 years," Bowersox said.
"We had no idea what impact it would bring," Baker said. What the students can't bring the Spencer family is closure. Instead the beginning of a new chapter because Spencer's case has changed even more lives 26-years after her death. A prison warden found a soft spot. "I don't personalize but I got attached,” Bowersox said. Three students found their calling. "I want to work in the crime lab like Ronda,” said Guillians. “I want to be a victim advocate,” said student Tammy Stark. A family surrounded by pain says they found hope in complete strangers. "It will be good to know somebody will pay for what they did instead of sitting down to Sunday dinner like the rest of us," Paris said. The Spencer credits the class with keeping the spotlight on their case. Donald “Doc” Nash will be in court in Dent County next week (last week of April).
God rest her soul, she finally got some justice after all these years.
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