Carnahan Conviction Brings New Hope to Cold Case Victim

September 24, 2010|Emily Rittman, Paul McReynolds | Reporter, Photographer

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — After a murder conviction 25 years in the making, the families of other cold-case victims are holding out hope for justice.

A jury convicted Gerald Carnahan Thursday for the murder and rape of Jackie Johns in 1985. Johns’ father, Les Johns, received dozens of phone calls from family and friends relieved by the conviction. One phone call came from a father who understands Johns’ pain. Elmer Lewis’ daughter, Deb Lewis, disappeared two years after Jackie Johns.

For decades the two dads wanted answers. They often leaned on each other because their daughters also shared similarities in life and in death.

Jackie Johns disappeared in 1985. Deb Lewis disappeared in 1987.

"I’m sure Les told you this too but there isn’t a day that goes by that you don’t think about it,” Lewis said. “You still have pictures in your home but you get by because you know she's in heaven."

Both Johns and Lewis’ cars were found without them inside. “It caught my eye because the parking lights were on the headlights weren't and the driver side door was open,"
former radio news reporter Bob "B.J." Honicutt said. He found Lewis’ car along Highway 160 in 1987. He later realized he found a crime scene. "When her body was discovered I believe in Newton County,” Honicutt said. “It felt really, really weird because I had been just a few minutes behind a possible abduction."

Another stranger found Johns' body in Lake Springfield. "Jackie Johns’ car was full of blood and it had all the evidence in there and Debbie's there was nothing, nothing touched in her car," Lewis said.

Both crimes went unsolved for decades. "I think there (are) always people out there that want to see cold cases solved," Honicutt said.

Lewis wanted to see Johns' case solved just as much as his own daughter’s. He anxiously watched Carnahan's trial. "I prayed that the good Lord would touch those jurors to do the right thing," Lewis said.

Lewis shared an "elated" phone call with Johns on the day of the verdict remembering their daughters and late wives. "We've laughed about Marie and Shirley getting together up there watching this trial and Debbie and Jackie is out playing somewhere," Lewis said.

Both Johns and Lewis' daughters knew Carnahan. Johns said his daughter, Jackie, briefly worked for him for just a few days. Lewis says his daughter went to the lake with him and a group of friends. Johns worked at a Nixa café the Carnahan family ate at. Lewis sold cold drinks at a sports complex Carnahan reportedly frequented.

"It’s a strange thing after he (Carnahan) has been put away there has not been another girl disappear in this area,” Lewis said. “That's not saying he's guilty of all of them but it’s odd it happened that way."

Although Lewis says many speculated Carnahan’s possible involvement in his daughter’s death, he says he hasn’t seen any evidence to prove it. Lewis thinks two Newton County men, suspected early on, may be responsible for his daughter’s death but officers never linked them to the crime.

Lewis says two young men from Newton County confronted his daughter at a club she went to the night of her disappearance. He says her body was found in a very remote part of Newton County. He thinks only a local would know how to find the spot. Once an autopsy was performed on Lewis' bones they could not determine how she died. Lewis says they thought she was possibly strangled.

Johns lived to see his daughter's killer convicted. At 93, Lewis isn't so sure he'll share the same fate. "Maybe, maybe someday," Lewis said. As a motorcycle rider and skydiver in his 90s, it seems Lewis is trying to live life to the fullest because his daughter never got the chance.

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