Bobbie Lynn Wofford, 14 Murdered 1999 Oklahoma
7 years later, girl's slaying haunts town By Robert Medley The Oklahoman KINGFISHER - A dirt road winds north from State Highway 33 on the west edge of the Kingfisher Cemetery. Seven years ago, concealed in those trees just north of the cemetery, the body of 14-year-old Bobbie Lynn Wofford lay. Her body rested there for four months before she was found, leading to a murder investigation in a rural community known as "the Buckle of the Wheatbelt." Recalling the 1999 murder of the teenage girl is hard, an old wound for many, said Ronald Griesel of Okarche, who once employed the girl's mother. He's still offering a $1,000 reward for information about the killer. Griesel and investigators said Wofford's family does not want to a speak about the case. Tommy Lynn Sells, 41, who said he killed Wofford, is on death row in Texas in a separate murder case. But the self-proclaimed serial killer's confession in the Wofford case is shaky and just plain unbelievable to a lot of people, Griesel said. No one has ever been charged in Wofford's murder. Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation agents, who have worked on the Wofford case over the years, still welcome any help from the public, spokeswoman Jessica Brown said. "Just because someone said they murdered a person doesn't mean they did it," Brown said. "Even if someone confesses, we check all the facts and then move forward. We haven't moved forward in this case." Wofford's death still is considered unsolved in the Kingfisher County sheriff's office, Sheriff Dennis Banther said. Banther said he thinks people just want to find the truth, "whatever it is." "It is a case that is still under investigation and will continue to be so until charges are filed against a suspect," Banther said. Wofford, remembered as a smiley, blond teenager, stood 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighed 115 pounds. She was reported to have been seen at 4 a.m. July 5, 1999, at the Love's Country Store across the street from the Kingfisher County sheriff's office. On Nov. 4 that year, quail hunters found her small purse and called then-Sheriff Danny Graham. Graham found her decomposing, clothed body in the woods. DNA tests identified the missing girl. Kingfisher Cemetery sexton Lester Hamil said he remembers a putrid odor lingering in the air for weeks. A calf or wild animal could have died, he thought. He didn't realize Wofford's body was there. The girl was one of his own daughter's friends, and a best friend of his neighbor. Hamil said Wofford's death shook a city not used to such a violent crime. "Our big question we always asked was why was a 14-year-old out at 4 a.m.?" Hamil said. "I have always used Bobbie as an example to my own daughters about what can happen." Investigators were told that Wofford had been seen the night she disappeared talking to a man who appeared to be about 6 feet tall, 160 pounds and about 40 years old, a sheriff's report said at the time. The man was described as having a fair complexion and long, light-brown hair. He drove a red pickup covered in dust with a white bumper, a witness told investigators. Growing up between Cashion Schools and Kingfisher, Bobbie Wofford had friends in both communities. D.L. Robertson, the Cashion dean of students today who taught history and coached junior high and high school football seven years ago, recalls the Wofford murder as a trauma to students unlike anything else. "Any time you lose a student, you go through disbelief. But the way this happened, it was a shock," Robertson said. When Sells claimed in 2001 to have killed Wofford, the girl's friends and others were relieved to have some sense of closure, he said. Robertson wondered how she could have been so "unlucky" to be picked up by a serial killer. "She was a young girl full of energy, always smiling," Robertson said. "We'd never had a loss like that in our student body." E.A. "Ard" Gates, recently retired Kingfisher County assistant district attorney, suggests the investigation continues. "We haven't closed the book on it," Gates said. Gates' last day as an assistant district attorney was Friday. He retired to run for an associate district judge seat in Kingfisher County. Sells claimed to have killed about 70 people in all 50 states. Today, he sits in a Texas Department of Criminal Justice prison awaiting execution in the murder of Kaylene Harris, 13. In September 2000, he was sentenced to death in the Dec. 31, 1999 murder of Harris near Del Rio, Texas. Sells told investigators that in 18 years time he'd traveled around cutting throats, bludgeoning and shooting people to death. Authorities are not sure how many murders he really committed. There is no execution date set as Sells appeals the death sentence. Griesel, in Okarche, said he still hopes his reward money might help someday. "It would be fantastic if something comes from this," Griesel said. "If we get an arrest and a conviction, I would come forward with the money." http://newsok.com/article/1856483/?template=home/main How to help Anyone with information about the Bobbie Lynn Wofford case can call the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation hot line at (800) 522-8017 or the Kingfisher County Sheriff's Department at 375-4242. The road runs on an iron bridge over Kingfisher Creek, leading past an open field and a row of trees.