Chapter 32:Avril Terry is found.

 

    While being questioned in Boonville, as a crowd was gathered outside the jail,  Hashfield did not admit to raping or killing Avril.  

   It was a small town and investigative mistakes were made that would not happen today. Police allowed Avril’s father to question Hashfield directly.  Hashfield ended up with a black eye. 

   Hashfield would later tell investigators that he saw her on the square and helped her pick up some pennies she had dropped.  He said she asked to go for a ride.  He eventually said he took her to Grandview, Indiana and threw her in the river.  

    State Police Officers would take Hashfield out a side door surreptitiously so that they could drive him to Grandview and point out the place where he “threw her in the river”.  They found bloody evidence on the shore and brought in boats and dive teams. 

   On Wednesday August 18th, 1960, divers would recover Avril’s dismembered body. Parts of her tiny body had drifted with the current. Crowds of teenage onlookers sat on the bank in the late summer heat and watched as piece by piece her body was recovered from the muddy water. Her torso and arms were found first. Her legs and head were found last. 

   A few days later, an 8 year old girl, Sheila Lawson, of Rockport, Indiana would come forward with an account of escaping from Hashfield on July 24th of 1960. She said that Hashfield had offered her a babysitting job.  She was eager to make money and he was friendly and convincing. She got in the car with him but he did not take her to a home with children but instead took her to a wooded area and said he was going to kill her.  She managed to get away and ran to the highway where she was found and aided by another man, Thomas Barnett, who took her to her home. Sheila identified Hashfield out of a police lineup.

   The newspaper articles of the time never really contradict Hashfield’s story that it was Avril’s idea to go for a ride with him. It is infuriating. I have trouble believing that she went willingly with him.  He had scratches on his face and arms.  She absolutely did not go with him willingly. But the reporters never bring that up.  They seem to just take his word for it.  They just accept and print his side of the story. 

   Emmett O. Hashfield was taken to a jail in Evansville until crowds dispersed from the Boonville courthouse square. 

   Avril’s funeral was attended by more than 200 people. She was buried in Boonville and her tombstone has her nickname, “Honey”, on it. A little dog is also carved on the stone showing her love of animals.  

   He had some initial difficulty in finding a lawyer.  Eventually he would secure legal representation and his trial would take place further north in Bloomington, Indiana in 1962.  He was found guilty and sentenced to death.  

    Hashfield would be interviewed in prison as the Supreme Court would be deciding a landmark case on capital punishment. Hashfield’s sentence would be changed to life in prison. 

   In 1974, he would undergo a tonsillectomy.  He had some complications from the surgery and died two weeks later. At the time of his death he had spent 40 of his 67 years on earth in prison for rape. 

    While being questioned in Boonville, as a crowd was gathered outside the jail,  Hashfield did not admit to raping or killing Avril.  

   It was a small town and investigative mistakes were made that would not happen today. Police allowed Avril’s father to question Hashfield directly.  Hashfield ended up with a black eye. 

   Hashfield would later tell investigators that he saw her on the square and helped her pick up some pennies she had dropped.  He said she asked to go for a ride.  He eventually said he took her to Grandview, Indiana and threw her in the river.  

    State Police Officers would take Hashfield out a side door surreptitiously so that they could drive him to Grandview and point out the place where he “threw her in the river”.  They found bloody evidence on the shore and brought in boats and dive teams. 

   On Wednesday August 18th, 1960, divers would recover Avril’s dismembered body. Parts of her tiny body had drifted with the current. Crowds of teenage onlookers sat on the bank in the late summer heat and watched as piece by piece her body was recovered from the muddy water. Her torso and arms were found first. Her legs and head were found last. 

   A few days later, an 8 year old girl, Sheila Lawson, of Rockport, Indiana would come forward with an account of escaping from Hashfield on July 24th of 1960. She said that Hashfield had offered her a babysitting job.  She was eager to make money and he was friendly and convincing. She got in the car with him but he did not take her to a home with children but instead took her to a wooded area and said he was going to kill her.  She managed to get away and ran to the highway where she was found and aided by another man, Thomas Barnett, who took her to her home. Sheila identified Hashfield out of a police lineup.

   The newspaper articles of the time never really contradict Hashfield’s story that it was Avril’s idea to go for a ride with him. It is infuriating. I have trouble believing that she went willingly with him.  He had scratches on his face and arms.  She absolutely did not go with him willingly. But the reporters never bring that up.  They seem to just take his word for it.  They just accept and print his side of the story. 

   Emmett O. Hashfield was taken to a jail in Evansville until crowds dispersed from the Boonville courthouse square. 

   Avril’s funeral was attended by more than 200 people. She was buried in Boonville and her tombstone has her nickname, “Honey”, on it. A little dog is also carved on the stone showing her love of animals.  

   He had some initial difficulty in finding a lawyer.  Eventually he would secure legal representation and his trial would take place further north in Bloomington, Indiana in 1962.  He was found guilty and sentenced to death.  

    Hashfield would be interviewed in prison as the Supreme Court would be deciding a landmark case on capital punishment. Hashfield’s sentence would be changed to life in prison. 

   In 1974, he would undergo a tonsillectomy.  He had some complications from the surgery and died two weeks later. At the time of his death he had spent 40 of his 67 years on earth in prison for rape.