One year later, still no answers in sisters' homicides

Sisters Dorothy Hobbs, left, and Nellie Bradley peer out from a photo in a family album, while a message on the next page waits for the next chapter to be written. (John H. Sheally II | The Virginian-Pilot)

By Linda McNatt and Lauren King

WINTON, N.C.

For the past year, a picture of Nellie Bradley and Dorothy Hobbs has hung in the waiting area of the Hertford County Law Enforcement Center.

The lone poster is a constant reminder to the sheriff of his only unsolved homicide.

"When you close your eyes and think about it," said Sheriff Juan Vaughan Sr., "it could be your mom, your sister, your aunt. "

A year ago today, a passer-by driving along a dirt road about a mile from Murfreesboro, N.C., just over the Virginia state line, found the bodies of the two elderly sisters. They had been stabbed and stripped nearly naked.

Deputies discovered their 1996 black Ford Crown Victoria abandoned about 15 miles away in Southampton County. They found blood in the trunk.

A massive investigation began almost immediately involving the two sheriffs' departments and various other state and federal officials. A year later, authorities have some evidence and an FBI behavioral profile of the killer, but little else.

"We're still working it hard," Vaughan said. "It's been 12 months, but I don't think it's faded. There's not a month that has gone by that I haven't been asked about this."

Vaughan, family members of the sisters say, calls almost weekly and has apologized when he's had to ask the tough questions.

"Sheriff Vaughan has been so sensitive," said Linda Tuck, the youngest sister of the two women. "He's been wonderful. If he knows he's asking something that might upset us, he apologizes, says he wants us to understand he's just doing his job."

A $12,000 reward, announced early in the investigation, is still being offered for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case.

"I personally have lost a lot of sleep," Vaughan said. "I want to work it until we get it."

F amily members of Nellie Bradley and Dorothy Hobbs still gather regularly at the family farm in Emporia . From left, Linda Tuck, Vida Fajna, Cliff Rodgester , his wife Jane Rodgester and Steve Tuck get together recently to talk about the unsolved murders of the two sisters one year ago today.

When Hobbs, 74, and Bradley, 71, didn't come home Aug. 4, 2006, family members' mental alarms went off. They were expected by 5 p.m. to have their regular Friday night dinner with Hobbs' husband.

The sisters from Emporia had set off that morning to visit cousins in Boykins. They were known for their traveling adventures, but their memories - like their mother's before them - were beginning to slip.

"They knew every road around here, and they'd never had any trouble about getting lost," their younger brother, Cliff Rodgester, said with a chuckle. "They got stuck a couple of times, and I had to go pull them out."

In her younger years, Hobbs was a nurse. She drove for a rescue squad and drove people to Richmond for medical treatments. Both sisters loved playing cards and going to Hardee's, where they always ordered the same thing: a cheeseburger, fries, a chocolate milk shake and an apple pie.

Bradley had been a telephone operator and later a waitress. She'd had several operations for a rare disorder and wore a heavy brace on her right leg.

Both women were known to be kind-hearted and helpful. They loved children. When they died, donations made to Emporia's Zion Baptist Church in their names were used to buy playground equipment.

Bradley was the cook; Hobbs, especially in her later years, had gotten tired of cooking. She brought canned biscuits to family gatherings.

Just after 5 p.m. that day, Doris Bennett, Bradley's daughter, started calling to check on them.

Several family members went out, following the familiar back roads the sisters usually took. Tuck discovered that Hobbs had left a phone message for her at 3:35 p.m.

They were at a convenience store just down the road from her home in Franklin. They were fine. They'd gotten gas, Hobbs said on the answering machine.

Hobbs and Bradley were last seen about 4 p.m. in Boykins by the husband of one of the cousins they had gone to visit.

The bodies were found by someone on a four-wheeler at 7:38 p.m. The car was found about four hours later.

By then, the family had been told their sisters were dead, and nearly 20 family members were entrenched at the sheriff's office in Southampton County.

They waited through the night, gathering gruesome details of the slayings.

Hertford County Sheriff Juan Vaughan Sr., left, and Murfreesboro police Chief Darrell Rowe hope posters on display at this weekend’s Watermelon Festival will generate fresh leads. michael kestner | the virginian-pilot

When the sisters were found, Vaughan had gone home for the day. He was looking forward to participating in the annual North Carolina Watermelon Festival during the weekend and then taking a week long vacation with his wife to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary.

About 8 p.m., police in North Carolina were called to a dirt path off Vaughans Creek Road in Hertford County.

The two sisters were found about 30 yards apart.

Hobbs was face down. Bradley was lying on her back. Both had been mostly stripped except for dark socks. They were covered in dirt, insects, debris and blood. Their throats had been slit. Each had multiple stab wounds and bruises.

About a mile away in Murfreesboro, the Watermelon Festival was in full swing. Many of the police officers were there when they got the call.

Once the abandoned car was found in Southampton County, the two county sheriffs made the connection.

In the year since, investigators have collected several boxes of evidence and filled multiple thick binders with reports. Police have investigated more than 50 leads. None has panned out.

One of the most important clues came from the forensic investigation of the abandoned vehicle, where a third person's DNA and a bloody palm print were discovered.

Though the evidence hasn't produced a suspect, Vaughan said it did eliminate a few.

The car raised another question.

There were no keys found. Perhaps, Vaughan said, the suspect planned to return to the vehicle.

It's a theory, like so many other things.

Police still don't know whether the women were killed in Virginia or North Carolina.

Vaughan said the family was instrumental in helping police piece together the sisters' plans for the day and narrowing the possibilities of what might have happened to them.

The sisters would stop to help anyone who needed it, Vaughan said. Maybe that's what happened.

"They stopped or slowed down, and it turned bad for them," he said.

But a robber would have gained nothing from the two sisters. What little money they had wasn't missing, and Bradley's rings were still on her hands.

With a killer or killers still on the loose, family members said, somebody else could be in danger.

"A normal person couldn't commit a crime like this," said Tuck, their youngest sister. "We don't want it to happen to anyone else. We don't want anybody else to die."

A FBI behavioral profile, released in December, suggests that, after the killings, the suspect may have had a change of mood, such as wanting to be alone; used drugs or alcohol; missed work; or suddenly left the area.

Investigators have said they think the suspect may be from the area and was cut on the arm or hand during the attack.

To mark the anniversary of the killings, Vaughan had new posters printed. On Tuesday, he placed them around Murfreesboro, in case visitors to this year's Watermelon Festival might remember something. Southampton County Sheriff Vernie W. Francis Jr. plans to put up posters as well.

"I've asked people to think back," Francis said. "Sometimes the most insignificant thing is the key."

The sisters grew up in Emporia, in a family of eight with an outhouse containing three holes - one for Daddy, one for Mama and one for the six kids, Tuck said.

"I always thought we were rich," she said recently, smiling at the memory. "Then, I started to school and found out that most other people had indoor bathrooms."

The patriarch of the family, Charlie Rodgester, was a talented musician who played the banjo, fiddle and harmonica. Evenings were filled with music; weekends they spent in church, said Vida Fajna, another sister.

"He and Mama taught us that nothing was more important than family - except God," Tuck said.

Charlie Rodgester died in his sleep several years after his wife, but before he died, he warned each of his children.

"'You'd better do right,' he told us," Fajna said. "'Because, no matter where you are, I'll be watching.'"

Fajna said she often envisions him on Sundays still sitting at the head of the table.

After Charlie Rodgester died, the siblings agreed to keep the 180-acre farm. Saturdays are maintenance and cleanup days. On Sunday, they all have lunch there after church.

"We could all use the money," Tuck said about selling the farm, "but it wouldn't replace family."

When people ask them who lives in the home, they reply, "We all do."

As is the case every Sunday, the family of Charlie and Mable Rodgester will gather this Sunday after church.

Everybody will bring a dish. They will have a cookout in the yard and eat at picnic tables nestled among trees near the railroad tracks that run through Emporia.

"We'll lean on each other," Tuck said.

The sisters they lost, especially during times when the family is together, fill their thoughts, she said. They miss Bradley's sweet potato biscuits and butter beans, her laugh and her smile.

They miss the way the two of them could get together and beg others to play cards with them, and that way they had of snuggling a baby into their laps.

"The thing that always haunts me," Tuck said, "is that one of them had to watch the other die."

The sisters, she said, loved watching the trains pass the house. They noticed the number on each engine, and often wondered why they never saw an engine bearing the number "1."

Long after her sisters died, Tuck said she had nightmares about the horrible circumstances that surrounded their deaths.

Then, after praying one night, she had another dream. She saw them riding past the house on a train.

"The blood was gone from their bodies; they were fully dressed in beautiful clothes, with smiles on their faces," Tuck later wrote.

In bright letters, on the side of the train, was the numeral 1.

"I just knew they were in heaven then," she said.

Linda McNatt, (757) 222-5563, linda.mcnatt@pilotonline.com

Lauren King, (252) 338-2413, lauren.king@pilotonline.com