Corpse In The Cedar Chestpage 4 |
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The Commonwealth Attorney
mentioned other rumors he had heard, but the missing man's brother
just shrugged them off as idle gossip. Hazelrigg saw he wasn't
getting anywhere and finally called a halt to the questioning.
Meanwhile the dead
woman's mother Mrs. Dixie Salyer and the daughter Loretta, had gone to
the funeral home to identify the body, Loretta refused to look at the
decomposed corpse, but Mrs. Salyer made a positive identification.
In his autopsy
report to Hazelrigg, Dr. Thorsness said: "There was considerable
amount of post modem change. The viscera and brain were
unsatisfactory for study. There was a bullet wound of entrance
in the left lower chest which left a few powder marks which apparently
produced hemorrhage in the right pleural space and penetrated the
upper surface of the liver with exit in the right lower lateral chest
margin. The bullet were found in the clothing.
"There was a
bullet wound of entrance in the right lower occipital and small rim of
lead was found inside. This bullet traveled forward through the
base of the skill with exit through the lower left jaw and
lacerated the lip. That bullet was not found.. The cause
of death was bullet wounds in the head and chest. The murder
victim was fully dressed. She had been dead approximately nine
months.
Shortly after the
autopsy report was made Deputy Horn called Commonwealth Attorney
Hazelrigg from Inez. "Did you get anything out of Ira
Cantrell? he asked.
"YHazelrigg said the brother insisted he knew nothing about Virgie's death or where Henry might be. Maybe I can help, Horn told the Commonwealth Attorney. Just before Ira was taken away from here he handed me a slip of paper and asked me to keep it for him until he got back. The name of a hotel in Miami, Florida is written on the paper. Hazelrigg thanked Horn. "It's a long shot, he said "but I'm going to contact authorities in Miami right away. I'll give them a full description of Henry Cantrell. They can go to the Hotel and check. If he's there they will take him into custody" the Commonwealth Attorney called police in Florida City and briefed them on the case. We'll check right away. Lt. James Reese told Hazelrigg. "You'll hear from us as soon as possible." The detectives went to the Hotel and questioned the manager. Nobody was registered there by the name of Henry Cantrell but when Lt Reese described the man he was looking for the manager smiled. We've got no Henry Cantrell here he said but a man we know as Henry Pendleton answers that description. The Hotel man checked the register, Henry Pendleton had signed the book on May 18. He was working in a Miami restaurant as a dishwasher.
Reese took down the
address of the restaurant, thanked the hotel man and went back to
headquarters. A quick check with Hazelrigg in KY told the
detective that was Cantrell's mother's maiden name.
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The Miami detective went
to the restaurant and talked with Henry Pendleton. There was no
doubt about it the dishwasher answered the description Henry Cantrell
perfectly. Moreover, the man admitted his true identify. I
got tired of using the name Cantrell, he told Reese. I never did
like it.
Taken to police headquarters and told that he was charged with the murder of his wife, in Fuget, KY, the 51 year old man didn't blink an eye. I don't know anything about that, he said. She up and left me last Oct. I didn't report her missing because there 's no use reporting a wife running off in that neighborhood. Lt. Reese put Henry Cantrell under lock and key and then called Commonwealth Attorney Hazelrigg. "We've got your man Cantrell, " the officer said. "He denies everything, send somebody for him." Trooper Music and Detective Cornett left for Miami. They brought Henry Cantrell back to Paintsville Sunday morning, July 12. Somebody tried to snap the prisoner's picture as the officers took him from the car to the courthouse. Cantrell didn't like that. "I've been framed," he said. "There will be no more pictures and no more conversation until I retain a attorney."
Trooper Music and
Detective Cornett said Cantrell had refused to discuss the case on the
return trip north. "He claims to be innocent."
Trooper Music told Commonwealth Attorney Hazelrigg, " but he was
preparing to go to Cuba when Miami police picked him up."
As this account of
the investigation is prepared for publication, Henry Cantrell remains
in Johnson County jail charged with murder. but there's are
still many unanswered questions which perhaps the trial will clear
up.. The murder weapon had not been found. Is it in
the well that was cemented over? And is anything else there?
Who was the woman who appeared in Hungtingon, W.VA. with Henry in
March and posed as Virgie when the two signed a chattel mortagage on
the black Mercury car? Why was that car pushed into the Ohio
river and never reported missing?
Were there really
three bullet holes in the door facing inside Henry Cantrell's trailer?
If so, were they linked to the destruction of the trailer by fire?
Whose black car was seen outside Mrs. Evalena Stamper's house that
November morning she was murdered? Above all: Why was she shot
to death and her body buried in the Cedar chest?
The mountain people
want to know the answers to those questions. Perhaps Henry
Cantrell's trial will answer most of them. Certainly, it
will determine whether he is innocent or the degree of his guilt.
Until that time Henry Cantrell, like all persons under the American
Code of Justice, is presumed to be innocent
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