Police use profile in Holt case

Authorities enlist FBI in drawing up likely description of killers of Sam's Club manager

Web posted July 14, 1999

By Meghan Gourley
Staff Writer

On the trail of several suspects in the year-old slaying of Sam's Club Manager David Holt, Richmond County sheriff's investigators have enlisted the help of FBI profilers to make sure they're on the right track.

As the investigative file of the grisly slaying grows, criminal or behavioral profiling has become the latest in investigative techniques used to create the persona of someone likely to commit such a crime.

Sheriff's Chief Deputy Ronald Strength would confirm only that investigators are using profiling in the case, but he declined to discuss details.

Mr. Holt, 45, was found burned beyond recognition in the trunk of his Mazda Protege on June 21, 1998, by firefighters responding to a report of the burning car off Sand Pit Road in Aiken County.

He had left his job a few hours earlier at Sam's Club on Bobby Jones Expressway, but apparently came back to the store. The store later was robbed and the safe emptied. Police say robbery was the motive for the killing.

The community most recently has heard about profiling in the Keenan O'Mailia slaying case in which the 6-year-old boy was sexually assaulted and strangled in the woods in North Augusta.

Agents with the FBI and South Carolina's State Law Enforcement Division conducted profiling in the O'Mailia case in the spring.

Although the profiling did not directly lead to the arrest of William ``Junior'' Downs, North Augusta police have said the profile was remarkably similar to Mr. Downs.

Police look for minute details to help form a profile: how and why a person was victimized and in what manner. Looking at instruments used in the crime and whether torture was involved contributes to whether a crime is considered personal.

Investigators have said several people are suspected in the Sam's Club robbery and killing, and whoever the killers are, they had intimate knowledge of the store.

More than a year has passed since the slaying, but Chief Deputy Strength said that has not hindered the investigation.

``If you don't have any suspects, it's definitely a hindrance,'' he said. ``But when you have good leads, like we do, it's not a hindrance at all. We're still very confident.''

Meghan Gourley covers crime for The Augusta Chronicle. She can be reached at (706) 823-3227 or mgourley@augustachronicle.com.