Bazetta aims to solve cold murder cases
By DARCIE LORENO Tribune Chronicle
POSTED: January 16, 2008
BAZETTA — Police Chief Charles Sayers wants some help solving two lingering homicide cases.
Discussions are under way about hiring a consultant to investigate the cases. One is for a body found in a cemetery 1992; the other is skeletal remains found by fishers in 2006.
‘‘Fresh eyes with a new perspective may bring some closure,’’ Sayers said.
The 1992 case is the death of All Souls Cemetery manager John McCulley. A duck hunter found McCulley’s decomposed body behind the maintenance building in the cemetery that October. McCulley had been shot five times in the chest.
His girlfriend had reported him missing a few weeks earlier after he didn’t come home from work.
The Trumbull County Sheriff’s Office and the Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Identification jointly investigated the case. One investigator thought a lawman had been involved because of the caliber of weapon and pattern of shots on McCulley’s chest.
‘‘We have some evidence and other things we’d like to be reviewed,’’ Sayers said. ‘‘Whether or not we’d be able to bring new evidence or witnesses to that case, I don’t know. That particular case is quite old, so we’d like to focus primarily on that case.’’
The other unsolved case involves the skeleton found near Mosquito Creek Reservoir in July 2006. The skeletal remains were found in a wetland area of the state park near an intake of Warren’s water treatment plant on Warren Meadville Road. The skeleton was found by a man and woman who were fishing in the area.
All investigators know is that the remains were of a roughly 50-year-old black man who stood 5 foot 8.
Sayers said he’s been looking into consultant possibilities for about six months and has someone in mind with experience in cold case investigations. It’s too preliminary to give a name, he said.
Sayers discussed the idea with Bazetta Township trustees this week.
‘‘Some of them were a long time ago, and if we can bring closure, that’s good,’’ Trustee Michael Piros said.
Sayers said while the focus of any work will be those two cases, the person could also handle any other major case that might pop up.
dloreno@tribune-chronicle.com
