Today's edition of Flashback Friday covers a murder mystery that took place 73 years ago in Byram. 22-year-old Catherine Rossie went to the Gold Coast with some friends on July 8, 1946. All party-goers were from Crystal Springs. Rossie disappeared later that night as the foursome returned from a night of carousing in East Jackson. Her mutilated body was found thirteen days later near Byram. Bobbie Gaddy, his wife Glenna, and Robert Gaddy were the prime suspects but were exonerated.
The search for the killer continued until 1948. Police arrested Edward Sant. He told police he killed her with a blackjack, laughing as he related the crime. However, he refused to sign a confession. He told police she fled when the Gaddies got into a heated argument after the foursome returned from East Jackson. Gant said he picked her up on Highway 51 in Copiah County. He was a combat veteran of Okinawa and had two children. A former Jackson lawman, the first Mississippi officer trained by the FBI, stayed on the case after he left public service and cracked it two years later in New Mexico.
There are no newspaper stories about the actual outcome but Sant was convicted of her murder.
9 comments:
Eddie Williams murder is still unsolved. It would be nice if you rattled some cages on his case. He was murdered in Jackson on August 28, 2002. No one was ever indicted on his murder.
Whatever happened to Sant? Execution? Violent death is prison? Live 40 year and then die of natural causes?
I agree with 3:45pm. Eddie’s story needs to be told.
Also of popular note is the faked death of Jackson Councilman Ed Cates, whose 'body' was found burning in a torched car on a Madison County Roadside. His widow, however, started receiving money orders in the mail and the FBI later knocked down a Georgia motel door to find Old Ed...who had been mailing the money.
Ed never said and the law never found out who the charred remains were.
That and the death of Annie Laurie Herring are two of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the Capital City. These two have to rank ahead of a supreme court justice doing 96 on his Harley on the Waterworks Curve! Well....maybe.
Grew up in Jackson and remember a news story late 60s - early 70's, and a young white girl was reported abducted from her Jackson home. Think they later found one or both of parents were involved. Anyone recall that story?
9:59: Mona Biddy?
Yeah thanks. Mona Biddy...Story scared every kid & parent in Jackson, back in the day.
What DID really happen to old Annie Laurie Hearin? The story just kind of dwindled away when the chattering classes got interested in something else. Many thought her old coot husband was behind it all. Anybody know anything?
Hi, thank you for posting these articles and story. This was my great-grandma’s sister. I’ve been looking for newspaper articles and have never found this many. Now I now how intense the search was for her and that makes me happy.
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