Augusta-Richmond County Sheriff Deputies investigate the murder of Sam's Club store manager on June 21, 1998 . FILE/STAFF

Holt probe mirrors JonBenet investigation

Police, lawyers need more proof to arrest, try suspects

Web posted October 25, 1999

 Unsolved cases

By Sandy Hodson
Staff Writer

As Wayne Bunton works to arrest those responsible for killing Sam's Club manager David Holt, the Richmond County sheriff's homicide investigator can empathize with his Boulder, Colo., counterparts' attempts to solve the slaying of JonBenet Ramsey.

Recently, after a yearlong grand jury session ended without any criminal indictments, Colorado's governor appointed a special law enforcement panel to decide whether a special prosecutor should be appointed to the case of the 6-year-old girl found dead in her Boulder home Dec. 26, 1996.

``They can never stop,'' Investigator Bunton said of the Boulder police investigation into JonBenet's homicide. Boulder investigators need to keep the case before the public, which can help generate new leads to follow, Investigator Bunton said.

Keeping an unsolved homicide case before the community has been an ongoing effort in the investigation of Mr. Holt's slaying.

``The billboards are going back up,'' the investigator said.

For months, Mr. Holt's picture rose above Augusta streets.

``Who murdered David Holt?'' the billboards read, along with a reminder of the $200,000 reward for information leading to the killers.

In the early morning hours of June 21, 1998, Mr. Holt's burned remains were discovered in the trunk of his Mazda Protege, parked off Sand Pit Road in Aiken County, just across the river from downtown Augusta. Investigators also discovered that the Sam's Club on Bobby Jones Expressway had been robbed. They believe someone forced Mr. Holt to unlock the store's door and the safe sometime after Sam's had closed for the night.

Although law enforcement has been frustrated by the lack of arrests in Mr. Holt's slaying, local investigators face the same problem as Boulder police: It won't do any good to arrest someone if investigators don't have evidence to back it up.

``I think one of the stumbling blocks they (Boulder police) ran into from the beginning ... (is) the parents refused to give a statement,'' Investigator Bunton said.

Several problems seemed to plague the investigation into the little girl's slaying from the beginning, including that JonBenet's parents, not the police, searched the home and found the body in the basement, Investigator Bunton said.

In any homicide investigation, police focus first on those closest to the victim, Investigator Bunton said. That is even more true in a child homicide case, he said. That doesn't mean they are guilty, but they must be eliminated as suspects before the investigation can move to others, he explained. In JonBenet's case, Boulder investigators never moved past that point, for whatever reason, he said.

How police officers approach suspects can determine whether or how they cooperate, Investigator Bunton said. If officers take an accusatory approach, suspects could feel so threatened that they are afraid to talk and will request a lawyer, he said.

A suspect's request to have a lawyer present should not make the person more of a suspect, said Augusta lawyer Clay Jolly. Any lawyer is going to tell a client not to talk to police without having an attorney present, he said, adding that it's a law-school textbook response.

``I don't see a problem with that. And it shouldn't put reasonable suspicion on someone,'' Mr. Jolly said. It should not hamper police questioning, either, he said. A lawyer's duty at that point isn't to keep someone from cooperating with law enforcement.

The Ramseys eventually did talk with investigators, with their lawyers present. They were not called as witnesses before the grand jury, however.

And even if they were, that doesn't necessarily mean there would be an indictment.

A lack of an indictment means a prosecutor could not convince a grand jury there is even probable reason to believe a suspect committed a crime. In the JonBenet case, the prosecutors had next to nothing in the way of evidence, even though John and Patsy Ramsey remain under a cloud of suspicion, defense and prosecuting attorneys said.

``If you have a problem getting an indictment, there's no way in the world you are going to get a conviction,'' said Toombs Judicial Circuit District Attorney Dennis Sanders.

In Georgia, it takes only the majority of 23 grand jurors to find probable cause and issue an indictment, Mr. Sanders said. That's a much lower burden than a trial conviction, which requires the unanimous vote of 12 jurors saying someone is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, he said.

And an indictment doesn't necessarily mean the case will go to trial. Information might surface after an arrest or indictment, usually from the suspect or attorney, that changes a prosecutor's mind, said August Judicial Circuit District Attorney Danny Craig. For example, the suspect might present an alibi defense that can be corroborated, he said.

But the case won't even make it that far unless a prosecutor feels good about it.

``Almost all prosecutors have a policy that unless they are confident they can convict a defendant beyond a reasonable doubt, they won't take a case to a grand jury,'' Mr. Craig said.

Unsolved cases

In Richmond County, investigators have arrested suspects later convicted in the majority of the homicides since 1991. Some, however, remain open. Here are the number of homicide cases that remain unsolved over the past few years:

1991: 12 of 66

1992: four of 38

1993: seven of 42

1994: seven of 38

1995: three of 24

1996: six of 35*

1997: eight of 31*

1998: five of 26

1999 (through Oct. 21): one of 13

*Investigators' main suspect in one homicide was killed before being charged. Also, in 1997 and 1998, those arrested in 12 homicide cases were acquitted, never indicted or had charges against them dropped.