Independence from Uncertainty

by Diane Fanning

Today is the eleventh anniversary of the murder of fourteen-year-old Bobbie Lynn Wofford from Kingfisher, Oklahoma. She was last seen at Love's Country Store at 4 a.m., July 5, 1999. Tommy Lynn Sells confessed that he was there, too. He stopped to put air in a tire with a troublesome leak.

Spotting the young blond woman on the pay phone, he offered her a ride.

In a secluded area, he forced her to perform oral sex and raped her with a ratchet. In an attempt to escape, she jerked open the door and Sells grabbed his gun. He pulled the trigger and Bobbie Lynn Wofford fell dead in the dirt on the side of the road.

Bobbie Lynn's mother, Susan, had no idea of what happened to her daughter for four long months. On November 4, men hunting quail stumbled across Bobbie Lynn's purse. Sheriff Danny Graham sent out a team to that location. They found her body decomposing in the woods, apparently killed by a gunshot to her head.

Sells (right) was arrested two months later for the murder of thirteen-year-old Katie Harris in Del Rio, Texas. Once in custody, he confessed to other homicides. During their extensive investigation, Texas Rangers John Allen and Coy Smith located a pair of earrings Sells had given to a woman in town. They matched a necklace found on the body of Bobbie Lynn Wofford.

Local law enforcement, state investigators and the FBI wanted the case to go to trial. One thing stood in their way: prosecutor Ard Gates. Gates had been burned once before by a false confession by another man arrested in Texas, Henry Lee Lucas (left). He was cautious and skeptical to a fault. He refused to move the case forward.

The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation was convinced of Sells' guilt. In recognizing Agent Steve Tanio with the 2001 Agent of the Year Award, they cited the detective for identifying the suspect and obtaining his confession in Bobbie Lynn's murder.

Still, in February 2002, Gates was continued to drag his feet. He spoke at a Rotary Club luncheon explaining his reluctance. Even though Susan Wofford identified the earrings as the ones matching her daughter's necklace, the prosecutor insisted that they were not a match. He dismissed Sells' story even though the serial killer was able to pick Bobbie Lynn out of a photo line-up, describe the isolated area where her body was found, and identify the correct type of weapon used to fire the fatal shot. He described it all as lies, despite knowing that law enforcement located the truck he drove that night and corroborated the leaking tire, and that witnesses had identified both Sells and his pick-up truck. Gates insisted there was no solid forensic evidence.

The case remains open. Current Kingfisher County Sheriff Dennis Banther told a reporter at The Oklahoman: "Periodically, we still receive phone calls. Whether we think it's a good lead or not, we still track it down. We investigate every lead. A day doesn't go by that we don't think about that case. We even have a Wofford room here where we can spread out all our information. Trust me, that file is not store in a basement somewhere."

Eleven years later, the same questions remain: Is the case already solved? Or was Ard Gates right and everyone else wrong? Will Bobbie Lynn Wofford ever find justice?

Bobbie Lynn is not alone in this cold pursuit. She is just one of a number of unsolved murders in small towns in Oklahoma.

In Cheyenne, 89-year-old Luella "Granny" Wright was killed in her bed on July 28, 2001. Authorities have a suspect, but he is sitting in a Mexican prison. However, even if they had him in custody, they are not certain they have sufficient evidence to convict.

Melissa Flores (left) was last seen on January 27, 2007. Her car and purse were found at an estranged boyfriend's home in Cordell. Her body has never been found. Last month, the OSBI renewed their $10,000 reward for information in her case.

Thirteen-year-old Taylor Placker and 11-year-old Skyla Whitaker were shot thirteen times with two different weapons. Their bodies were found on a dirt road, 300 yards from the Placker home. The reward fund for information in that case now stands at $160,000. A grand jury empanelled in September 2008 returned no indictments.

The body of Carol Daniels (right), pastor of Christ Holy Sanctified Church in Andarko, was found behind the altar of the sanctuary on August 23, 2009. Her knife-slashed body was arranged in the position of a crucifix.

It is likely in every case that someone has remained silent--that somebody has the knowledge to unlock these mysteries. On this long Independence Day weekend, we can only hope that one of those people will step forward and give the loved ones of these victims independence from uncertainty, and freedom from the questions that have haunted them day after day.

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Lessons from the Dead

by Diane Fanning

When I travel to a high school to speak to students, I take with me the lessons I have learned from the dead -- how not to become a victim, how to recognize warning signs in a relationship, how to trust your intuition.  Because, in most instances, the victim has contributed to their victimization.

Ask any seasoned violent crimes investigator.  They'll tell you that they rarely see a totally innocent victim.  Something the person did or didn't do set them up for the predator.  Did that mean they deserved their fate?  Absolutely not.

 

The fact is that predators are constantly on the lookout for vulnerability and opportunity.  Controllers seek relationships with those they can dominate.  They all prey on our weakness, and we need to know how to conceal it from them.

 

It is especially true of adolescents, who often do not think past the present moment, do not believe they will die, and find it easy to accept something that is too good to be true.  So I strive to teach them the discernment they need to help them not become victims. One case that I often speak about is the murder of Bobbie Lynn Wofford.

Bobbie Lynn made one big mistake: she lied to her mother.

She said she was going to the lake for the Fourth of July weekend in 1999 with a friend and her family.  Instead, her friend picked her up at the house to deceive Bobby Lynn's mother, then left her with a group of kids that Mrs. Wofford did not trust.  Did they harm the girl?  Not directly.

They did drop Bobby Lynn off at a convenience store at two in the morning.  She had no ride home.  She knew she could call her mother but also knew if she did, she'd get in trouble.  Thinking that was as bad as it could get, Bobby Lynn accepted the first offer of a ride she received from a man in the parking lot.

Unfortunately for Bobby Lynn, that man was serial killer Tommy Lynn Sells (right). By the time the 15-year-old listened to the demands of her intuition, it was too late.  Her body was not found for more than four months.

 Whether I am talking to a small class of students or a group of 300 stuffed into every available space in the library,  when this story is finished, silence fills the pause.  I scan the faces and see tears on some cheeks and fear in most eyes.

No matter how careless they are or how risky their behavior, many of these teenagers will never encounter a serial killer.  But they will all have a relationship, probably many of them in their lifetime.  I talk to them about the red flags they can encounter there.  I talk about physical abuse leading to homicide.

 

In the absence of violence, I caution them not to be complacent when analyzing the safety of a relationship -- sometimes the only incident of abuse is the ultimate one -- murder.  I tell them about my books with stories of one spouse killing another.  In nearly every case, there is controlling behavior.  I've told them what it looks like and how, in the hands of a clever manipulator, it can look like a symptom of true love.

 

I warn them about another red flag -- secrets.  I talk about serial killer Richard Evonitz, who had a foot locker that neither of the women he married were allowed to open.  In it, he hid the underwear of victims and newspaper clippings of his crimes.  I discuss Michael Peterson (above, between his attorneys in court) and Richard McFarland ,who both had an office that no one else was allowed to enter.  One hid the secret of his bisexuality, the other hid a compulsion for multiple rebate entries.

The substance of what was hidden in the secret place was irrelevant -- it was its existence that presaged a problem.  I urge the students to evaluate their relationships and make troublesome behavior stop or get as far away from the person using it as they can.

I am gratified when I look out over the group and see girls elbowing the boy next to them or raising eyebrows in their direction.  I knew they got it, I hope they remember it, and I hope knowing it will make a difference in their lives.

Finally, I try to impress them with the importance of their own intuition.  It's hard for all of us to listen to it when we're being pulled in an opposite direction.  For teenagers it is a constant battle -- walk away from what a gut feeling says is a bad thing and be a social outcast.  Or do what feels like the wrong thing to go along with peers.  Gavin De Becker wrote THE GIFT OF FEAR, an informative and important book about the need to obey our instincts and respect our valid fears. I encapsulate its essence in the time remaining in a class period.

I know, though, as I look at over the students, that some will never learn any lessons from the dead.  Some won't make it to adulthood because of it.  Others will live to a ripe old age but encounter a lot of avoidable difficulty along the way because they cling to adolescent insecurities and the senseless fear of looking foolish.

 I can only hope that the message will get through to some of them -- that they will learn, remember and, one day, use it to save their lives -- or the life of a child yet to be born.

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