Secrets continue to surface from Foss Lake

Wednesday, law enforcement officials and an anthropologist continued to examine the two vehicles pulled from Foss Lake and collect evidence in hopes of shedding more light on two area cold cases.

Custer County Sheriff Bruce Peoples said three sets of human remains have been located in the 1969 Chevrolet Camaro. Investigators have confirmed one set of remains found in the 1952 Chevrolet but say there could be as many as three.

"We believe that we have two vehicles related to two different missing persons cases," said Peoples at 11 a.m. Wednesday. "One is a case from Beckham County in 1970, and the other is a case from Washita County in 1969."

Both vehicles were pulled to shore from 50 feet beyond the shoreline of the marina boat ramp Tuesday by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol. Troopers of the Lake Patrol Division discovered the vehicles, side by side in water 12-ft. deep, on Sept. 10 while testing new sonar equipment.

The Custer County Sheriff's department believes the blue 1969 Chevrolet Camaro is the car three teenagers from Sayre were last seen riding in on Nov. 20, 1970. The three left for a football game in Elk City but never made it home.

Peoples said investigators had removed the tag from the 1969 vehicle, and they are soaking it in hopes to be able to remove debris so that the tag is readable. 

There is no word yet on how or why the vehicle and its three Sayre passengers ended up in Foss Lake. Officials said Wednesday bottles of beer were found in the Camaro. 

"None of the human remains in the Camaro show signs of trauma on first inspection, but keep in mind that they're covered in mud and will need to be examined further in a lab, so we still don't really know," said Peoples.

The second vehicle, a four-door, dark-colored 1952 Chevrolet car, could be the vehicle driven by two or three people that went missing from Canute.

"The '52 Chevy, we're just now getting into it," said Peoples. "They're getting into the trunk.  We don't have any information yet on how many sets of remains may be in there."

Peoples and OHP troopers said it could be close to a year before DNA results confirm the identities of the bodies.

"The investigators will recover as much evidence as they can, and then they'll take what they need to up to the OSBI lab," said Peoples. "And, honestly, with their backlog, we may be looking at a year or more before we know anything. Obviously, this is an interesting case, but it will likely be on their back burner while they work more current, active cases."

A BECKHAM COUNTY COLD CASE

The Beckham County Sheriff's Office began the investigation into the disappearance of Jimmy Allen Williams, 16, Thomas Michael Rios, 18 and Leah Gail Johnson, 18, on Nov. 20, 1970. That's the night the three never returned to their Sayre homes, said retired Sheriff Howard Sampier.

"After we received the report that they were missing, I put the tag number out that night," remembers Sampier. "The next day I put the vehicle description and the description of the teenagers out nationwide and also gave the information out to watch for border crossings.  My whole crew and the Highway Patrol searched the surrounding area, but we never located anything."

Family of the teens told the sheriff's office the three were headed to Elk City to catch a football game. They left Sayre in Williams' blue 1969 Chevrolet Camaro.
Over the years, theories have been explored including that the teens may have decided to go hunting.

Sampier said that of all the leads received, not one was for Foss Lake.

"Never really had any good leads to speak of," said Sampier, who said it was the most troubling case in his law enforcement career. "We never had any sort of lead or idea about the Foss Lake area."

Current Beckham County Sheriff Scott Jay said his department has looked into the case several times.

"We have opened it up and looked at it three times," said Jay, who was elected sheriff in 2000.  "We have revisited it and we just kept coming up with dead ends. We used modern technology. We used different databases on the Internet but with no success until Tuesday morning."

Jay said they never looked towards Foss Lake but did examine surrounding rivers and ponds in Beckham County.

"I even contacted the military and tried to see if we could do something that would have been like a sonar on land," said Jay. "It was way too costly. We were going to go through the areas that we had determined was the route they might have taken."
The OHP was also active in the investigation. As recent as 2009, the OHP used a sonar device to try and locate the car in Lake Hudson in Mayes County near an old Ferry. Nothing turned up.

Sampier said that the families and friends of the teens understandably kept wanting answers down through the years.

"We did, too," said Sampier, who served as sheriff from 1964 to 1973.  "I tried to explain that we had done everything that law enforcement could possibly do.  You just can't make evidence up if it's not there."

Jay said families and friends continued to contact the department throughout the years to see if any new information from the case had surfaced.

"After determination of the outcome, we can close this case," said Jay.

A WASHITA COUNTY COLD CASE

The Custer County Sheriff's Department had few leads of who the 1952 Chevrolet belonged to Tuesday.

Peoples said that the department had one lead of two to three people that went missing after stopping at a Canute convenience store to purchase beer and told bystanders they were headed to Foss Lake.

Wednesday, the department was actively following a lead of the disappearance of Nora Marie King Duncan, 58, a Canute resident, who went missing from her residence on April 8, 1969. She was believed to have been in the company of two friends, Cleburn Hammock and John Alva Porter.

"We're working on the assumption that this is related to a case regarding a missing persons case from Canute, in Washita County, in 1969," said Peoples.  "We have an old copy of a letter that a relative wrote to the FBI regarding a missing woman who was possibly in the company of two men."

DISCOVERY

Trooper George Hoyle said the lake division installed the new 360 degree sonar equipment to the lake patrol boat on Sept. 5. Five days later, troopers began testing the sonar, which is intended to be used to help located drowning victims.

Hoyle said the parks department asked if a photo could be taken of the boat ramp near the marina. The water currently rests just four-feet above the end of the ramp due to recent drought conditions and low water levels.

"They want to lay some tarmac to extend the ramp," said Hoyle. "They asked us to take a picture. At our first take, I viewed what I thought was a PT Cruiser because I saw rounded wheel-wells. It actually ended up being a 1952 Chevrolet. Right beside it was the other car."

Hoyle told the parks department the vehicles need to be removed before any work could be done on the ramp and the dive team was called in.

Tuesday morning, the dive team, which consisted of Trooper Darrell Splawn of Elk City and Captain Jeremy Allread of the Oklahoma City area, took a first look at the vehicles.

"We first pulled the 1950s Chevrolet out and found one set of skeletal remains," said Hoyle. "We got it out and called OSBI and the medical examiner's office."

Hoyle said the OHP pulled out the 1969 Chevrolet Camaro next, where skeletal remains were found in the front and back seat of the vehicle.

Divers returned to the water Tuesday afternoon on the request of OSBI to recover more evidence from the lake bottom. Hoyle said more bones were located and a shoe was found at the shore line, which may have come from when the vehicles were pulled.

A full scan of the area near the boat ramp was performed by troopers with the 360 degree sonar. Troopers plan to continue to scan Foss Lake, beginning at the boat ramps. Foss Lake has six boat ramps.

"The first day we were able to use it was Tuesday and we have one day of looking," said Hoyle. "This is a big old lake. There are over 8,000 acres of lake here. This is just one view. We are going to use it."

PUTTING AN END TO THE UNKNOWN

All law enforcement officials said they hope Tuesday's discovery will help family and friends find peace.

"We are pretty certain this is going to be the three juveniles that went missing in 1970," said Jay. "Hopefully this will bring closure to the families. That's what it is all about – to bring closure after being in the unknown. It is very heart wrenching."
Sampier said he was stunned to learn the Sayre teens may have been found. He said he was close to passing out from surprise when he heard the news Tuesday.
"I'm glad they're found," said Sampier. "I know the families must be. We just never did know what happened to them, and it's still a mystery.  What were they doing out there at the lake?  We may never know the answer to that."

Daily Elk Citian Publisher Derek Manning contributed to the story.

This story can be found in the Thursday, September 19 print edition of the Daily Elk Citian.

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