BENTON (AP) - A southeast Missouri sheriff and the man who unseated him in the November election say they're not giving up on trying to crack a 19-year-old woman's slaying that's been unsolved for nearly a quarter century.
Sheriff Rick Walter, Scott County's sheriff since 2005, insists that he'll continue chasing any leads in Angela Mischelle Lawless' case even after he's out of office this month. His successor, Wes Drury, said he also intends to continue the investigation.
"We're still going to be able to be working on it," Walter said, undaunted by soon no longer having the sheriff's department's resources in trying to solve the cold case. "That doesn't mean things are not going to be followed up on or looked at it, at least on our end."
Lawless, a nursing student, was found dead in her car in November 1992 near the Benton exit off Interstate 55. She had been shot three times and had been struck in the head.
Joshua Kezer, who at the time was 17 and living in Illinois, was convicted of killing Lawless and sentenced to 60 years in prison. In 2009, a judge exonerated Kezer and ordered him freed from prison after ruling that key evidence was kept from Kezer's defense attorneys at trial. The judge also criticized the courtroom conduct of former special state prosecutor Kenny Hulshof, who later served six terms in Congress and unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for governor in 2008.
Four men who testified against Kezer recanted.
Kezer, who in 2010 settled for an undisclosed sum a wrongful-conviction lawsuit against Scott County and various former law enforcement officers, has said the community should rally around Walter in the effort to solve the case, which in 2010 was featured on CBS' "48 Hours Mystery."
Walter said evidence suggests that Lawless was attacked by two or three people and that she likely knew her assailant or assailants, given that friends and family said she was unlikely to pull over for someone she didn't know. Walter believes Lawless was struck outside her car.
Over the past two years, Walter and other investigators have re-interviewed witnesses who came forward after Lawless' death. New witnesses also have been questioned, and "they have kind of confirmed some things that we had suspected before," Walter said.
Investigators also exhumed Lawless' body in October 2013 from a Benton cemetery, collecting DNA samples for possible future testing.
Drury, the incoming sheriff, acknowledged that his investigators may not be able to pursue the case right away, but Walter said he understands the day-to-day demands of a new administration.
"When you're coming into office, there are a whole lot of things going on. Again, there's a lot of stuff, just the day-to-day operations you have to contend with," Walter said. "That's something he'll have to slowly get into."