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Several months after Christi Meek’s disappearance in January 1985, 10-year-old witness Tiffany Easter, described this suspect for an artist’s sketch. Sketch by Bruce Greene for Mesquite Police Department
After Christie Proctor’s abduction on February 15, 1986, police detectives re-contacted Tiffany Ibarra who described the suspect for a police sketch artist. Sketch/Dallas Police Department
The body of Christi Meeks was discovered on April 3, 1985 by two fisherman floating in Deer Haven Cove, Lake Texoma about 75 miles from Mesquite, Texas, where she where she was abducted in January. Photo/Mesquite Police Department
On February 12, 1986, Tiffany Ibarra was ten years old and walking to Bodie Elementary School in Dallas, Texas when she was abducted and then released by a young white man who had grabbed her on the sidewalk and pulled her into his van. She would be forever haunted by the bogeyman. Photo/Dallas Police Department
Christie Proctor’s skeletal remains were discovered beneath a mattress in a remote field near Plano, Texas in April 1988. Photo/Plano Police Department
Shannon Sherrill was six years old in October 1986 when she disappeared while playing hide-and-seek in her mother’s yard in Thorntown, Indiana. David Penton later told fellow inmates that he abducted and murdered her. Media File Photo
Jeff Heck was a young Indiana State Patrol officer whose area included Thorntown, Indiana when Shannon Sherrill disappeared. Nearly twenty years later, he would contact Gary Sweet about David Penton’s possible connection to Shannon’s abduction. He concluded that Penton was the prime suspect and filed a report with the prosecutor’s office in 2007 to that effect; the case remains “under investigation.” Photo/Jeff Heck
In 2003, a woman named Donna Walker (center) contacted Shannon’s parents and claimed to be their long-lost daughter. Hoping for a “miracle” the parents’ were taken in until Lt. Jeff Heck’s investigation revealed that her claims were a hoax and arrested Walker. AP Photo/Tom Strickland
David Penton after his arrest in April 1988 as a suspect in the abduction of Nydra Ross in Columbus, Ohio. Photo/Columbus Police Department
Roxann Reyes’ partial skeletal remains and her hair with a barrette still in it were discovered in a remote field near Murphy, Texas, in May 1988. Photo/Garland Police Department
Nydra Ross: Nine-year-old Nydra Ross was last seen alive talking to David Penton, a co-worker of her uncle who she was visiting in Columbus, Ohio in March 1988. Photo/Columbus Police Department
When Penton became a suspect in the disappearance of Nydra Ross, police seized his van and discovered traces of blood on the floor. The van also matched Tiffany Ibarra’s description of the van her abductor was driving in 1986. Photo/Columbus Police Department
Penton remained at large until 1990 when he was arrested for the murder of Nydra Ross. Convicted in 1991, he was sentenced to life in the Ohio State Penitentiary though would be eligible for parole. Photo/Ohio Department of Corrections
Michael Giles: Part of Detective Sweet’s learning curve investigating homicides was the murder of 80-year-old Smiley Johnson who was stabbed to death and sexually assaulted in 1996 by her grandson, Michael Giles, who was 15 at the time of the murder. Photo/Garland Police Department
A fan of “death metal” bands and a satan-worshiper, Giles told Sweet that he sexually assaulted his grandmother because he wanted to experience necrophilia. Journal/Garland Police Department
Satan worshipper Michael Giles was also the suspect in the brutal stabbing of a young black woman in the same neighborhood. However, despite the evidence, she claimed her assailant was an older black man. Art/Garland Police Department
As Gary Sweet got farther into the Reyes investigation, he kept an “inspiration book” with photographs of the child to remind him of who he was doing it for and combat the times when he wasn’t sure he would succeed. Photo/Gary Sweet
The bogeyman stalked his prey in the Dallas area during the mid-1980s, crossing jurisdictional lines to confuse law enforcement efforts to catch him. Graphic/Garland Police Department
Gary Sweet (middle) and Don Phillips (right) talk to a Columbus PD detective outside of the house where Penton grew up and later lived as an adult. The investigators located twenty pieces of cloth tied together beneath the floorboards located in the attic. When tested the cloth revealed blood and semen stains; however, the stains were too old to give positive DNA results. Photo/Garland Police Department
Albert Mulligan, a cellmate after Penton’s arrest for the Nydra Ross murder, drew this picture of his daughter who’d died young ascending to heaven. He told Sweet that Penton had taken the drawing and put breasts on the girl then added the swing-set, merry-go-round and lake, which he said was in Texas. Drawing/Garland Police Department
While detectives Sweet and Bradshaw talked to Penton at the Ohio State Penitentiary prior to his indictment, detectives Phillips and Meeks combed through Penton’s tidy cell. Photo/Garland Police Department
During their search, Phillips and Meeks discovered this plastic bag containing articles of civilian clothing tied together and hidden under his bed. They believe it was an “escape bag,” put together by Penton should the opportunity to escape present itself. Photo/Garland Police Department
The Texas detectives involved in the Penton investigation following their interviews with Penton prior to his indictment for the Texas murders, from left: Bruce Bradshaw, Don Phillips, Marletta Scribner , Gary Sweet and Billy Meeks. Photo/Garland Police Department
Detectives Billy Meeks and Don Phillips put together a Powerpoint presentation of the cases including this timeline that added two young women who stepped forward after Penton’s indictment in the spring of 2003.
Very well written… Heart and Passion was put into this book…I could not put it down…Having had the pleasure of meeting a family member of sweet innocent Roxanne, this nightmare has never left family.. You never want to believe this could ever happen to your family but it does and can..A must read!!!
I saw that boogey man when he took Roxann. I’m glad he’s gone.
roxann is my cousin, she is dearly missed.
He tried to kidnap me and my neighbor even saw him running through her backyard to escape. We called the police and they just took our statements. No sketch was asked for me to describe and I don’t think they even officially filed it or take it seriously, typical DeSoto, TX PD. I remember that day like it was yesterday. This was in 1986, I wonder how many others would’ve been saved or still alive today, if the DeSoto, TX PD actually followed though with real efforts to pursue him.