Triple Murder Unsolved After 6 Years, Blue Ridge Savings Bank, Greer, SC

[nanabillie]

http://www.wspa.com/spa/news/local/article/blue_ridge_savings_bank_murders_still_unsolved_aft er_6_years/17785/
Blue Ridge Savings Bank Murders Still Unsolved After 6 Years


Photo (http://www.wspa.com/spa/news/local/article/blue_ridge_savings_bank_murders_still_unsolved_aft er_6_years/17785/#fragment-2)
http://media.wspa.com/wspa/img-story/images/uploads/Blue_Ridge_Savings_Murder.jpg



By Noelle Kachinsky (nkachinsky@wspa.com)

Published: May 15, 2009
On Saturday, it will be six years since three people were murdered at Blue Ridge Savings Bank in Greer, and authorities still have not caught the killer.
Greer Poilce found teller Sylvia Holtzclaw, and customers Eb and Maggie Barnes shot to death inside the bank on May 16, 2003. The holtzclaw family told News Channel 7 it has been a tough six years, and they want the crime solved.
Greer Police have said the robber likely used a 40 caliber handgun. Police wanted to question 39-year-old Emmerson Wright. But he took his own life two years after the Greer murders as officers in Georgia were about to arrest him.
A $100,000 dollar reward will be offered to any tip that leads to an arrest and conviction.
If you have information you think could help solve this crime call Greer Police at 864-848-2151.

Post a Comment

[nanabillie]

http://www.goupstate.com/article/99999999/INDEPTH/518005974/1146?Title=Blue-Ridge-Savings-Bank-murders

Blue Ridge Savings Bank murders

http://www.goupstate.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?Site=SJ&Date=99999999&Category=INDEPTH&ArtNo=518005974&Ref=AR&Profile=1146&MaxW=595 (http://javascript<b></b>:NewWindow(500,400,'/apps/pbcs.dll/misc?url=/misc/zoom.pbs&Site=SJ&Date=99999999&Category=INDEPTH&ArtNo=518005974&Ref=AR&Profile=1146');)





Despite a nationwide search, no suspects in the case have been arrested.




Photos




Gallery: (http://www.goupstate.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Avis=SJ&Dato=20030516&Kategori=PHOTOS05&Lopenr=690076128&Ref=PH&Profile=1146)Blue Ridge Savings Bank scene (http://www.goupstate.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Avis=SJ&Dato=20030516&Kategori=PHOTOS05&Lopenr=690076128&Ref=PH&Profile=1146)

Recent Stories


<LI class=no_bul>Blue Ridge Savings Bank triple homicide still haunts families (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20080516/NEWS/805160341)

May 16, 2008
Today marks the fifth anniversary of the unsolved triple homicide at Blue Ridge Savings Bank in Greer.
<LI class=no_bul>Police seek info in Greer '03 slayings (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20070612/NEWS/706120356)

June 12, 2007
Greer police know how Emmerson Wright died. Now they want to know how he lived.
<LI class=no_bul>Man no longer 'person of interest' in case (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20060221/NEWS/602210333)

February 21, 2006
A Spartanburg man accused of robbing banks across South Carolina is no longer the main thrust of a Greer investigation into the 2003 holdup at the Blue Ridge Savings Bank that ended in a triple homicide.
<LI class=no_bul>Man confesses to 17 bank heists; police look for link to three deaths (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20060203/NEWS/602030394)

February 3, 2006
GREER -- A federal judge has ordered a psychiatric evaluation for a Spartanburg man being questioned in connection with the 2003 robbery and triple homicide at Blue Ridge Savings Bank off I-85 in Greer.
<LI class=no_bul>Police to release new information in case (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20060202/NEWS/602020338)

February 2, 2006
Greer police have called a news conference this morning to release information about a "person of interest" in the 2003 robbery and triple homicide at Blue Ridge Savings Bank off I-85 in Greer.
<LI class=no_bul>Authorities search for ties between robbery suspect, Blue Ridge homicides (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20060202/NEWS/60202003)

February 2, 2006
Greer police are asking the public for information on a Spartanburg man they believe could be connected to a bank robbery and triple homicide in 2003.
<LI class=no_bul>Greer police to release information about Blue Ridge 'person of interest' (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20060201/NEWS/60201063)

February 1, 2006
The Greer Police Department will hold a press conference Thursday to release information about a "person of interest" in the Blue Ridge Savings triple homicide cade.
<LI class=no_bul>Police wanted to talk to man who killed himself after chase (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20050816/NEWS/508160343)

August 16, 2005
A man who shot himself after a high-speed chase in Georgia this month had been a lead -- not a suspect but someone police wanted to talk to -- in connection with the 2003 triple homicide at Blue Ridge Savings Bank in Greer, said Lt. Chris Varner with the Greer Police Department.
<LI class=no_bul>Probing triple murder from a fresh angle (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20050217/NEWS/502170337)

February 17, 2005
The Spartanburg County Sheriff's Office has assigned a new senior investigator to assist in the investigation of the triple homicide at the Blue Ridge Savings Bank in Greer almost two years ago.
<LI class=no_bul>Point man on bank homicide case changing jobs, vows to keep working (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20050106/NEWS/501060359)

January 6, 2005
GREER -- Steve Denton has a new job, but he hasn't forgotten his old one.
<LI class=no_bul>Cause unites friends (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20041104/NEWS/411040328)

November 4, 2004
GREER -- Sylvia Holtzclaw was the glue that held her circle of friends together.
<LI class=no_bul>Cause unites friends (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20041103/NEWS/411030457)

November 3, 2004

<LI class=no_bul>Bank homicide lawsuit settled (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040826/NEWS/408260353)

August 26, 2004
The children of a couple slain in a Greer bank robbery in 2003 have settled with Blue Ridge Savings Bank of Asheville, N.C., and will not sue bank owner U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor, R-N.C.
<LI class=no_bul>Children of bank victims include congressman in suit (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040716/NEWS/407160329)

July 16, 2004
The children of customers slain in the 2003 robbery of a Blue Ridge Savings Bank in Greer have moved to sue North Carolina Rep. Charles Taylor, who owns a majority of the Asheville-based bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Police tack up posters in bank murder probe (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040708/NEWS/407080380)

July 8, 2004
Posters popping up around town are evidence that Greer has not forgotten Blue Ridge Savings Bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Investigators hope new posters lead to information about bank killings (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040707/NEWS/407070396)

July 7, 2004
Investigators are preparing to blitz the nation with 25,000 posters they hope will help them solve a Greer triple murder.
<LI class=no_bul>Greer unites during memorial for bank robbery victims (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040517/NEWS/405170336)

May 17, 2004
GREER -- The Greer community took time to remember the three people who were killed in the Blue Ridge Savings bank robbery last year.
<LI class=no_bul>One survivor files wrongful-death lawsuit against bank (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040516/NEWS/405160429)

May 16, 2004
Blue Ridge Savings Bank has been hit with a wrongful-death lawsuit as a result of the robbery and triple murder that took place last May at the bank's Greer branch.
<LI class=no_bul>One year later, no arrests in triple murder (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040516/NEWS/405160342)

May 16, 2004
A year after the robbery and triple murder at Greer's Blue Ridge Savings Bank, life is nowhere near the same for those left behind.
<LI class=no_bul>Bank heist by masked gunman thwarted (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20040416/NEWS/404160358)

April 16, 2004
GREER -- A masked gunman made an aborted robbery attempt Thursday at Blue Ridge Savings Bank -- the same bank where three people were killed in a robbery last spring.
<LI class=no_bul>Memories of Mom (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030921/NEWS/309210402)

September 21, 2003

<LI class=no_bul>Police may know type of auto used in holdup (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030717/NEWS/107170001)

July 17, 2003
GREER -- With help from sources that include Disney, General Motors and Car and Driver magazine, investigators believe they now know the type of car they are looking for in relation to a deadly bank robbery.
<LI class=no_bul>Greer police put in endless hours to solve bank, Cannada murders (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030715/NEWS/307150349)

July 15, 2003
GREER -- Police still are working to crack two Greer crime cases in which four people were shot dead.
<LI class=no_bul>Taylor ordered bank to fudge its books, ex-executive claims (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030707/NEWS/307070333)

July 7, 2003
RALEIGH, N.C. -- The former president of a bank controlled by U.S. Rep. Charles H. Taylor of Brevard told the FBI that Taylor used the bank to pay off a campaign worker's bonus and fix up property he then acquired.
<LI class=no_bul>Profile released in bank killings (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030612/NEWS/106120001)

June 12, 2003
GREER -- Police still don't know who robbed the Blue Ridge Savings Bank last month, killing an employee and two customers.
<LI class=no_bul>Hundreds gather at prayer rally (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030609/NEWS/106090002)

June 9, 2003
GREER -- Greer Police Chief Dean Crisp asked hundreds gathered Sunday to &quot;pray the thunder down&quot; on those responsible for a triple murder at a bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Greer gathers to remember bank robbery victims in prayer (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030609/NEWS/106090001)

June 9, 2003
GREER -- Greer Police Chief Dean Crisp asked hundreds gathered Sunday to &quot;pray the thunder down&quot; on those responsible for a triple murder at a bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Reward in bank killings now $100,000 (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030605/NEWS/306050358)

June 5, 2003
GREER -- The number of leads and the amount of reward money continue to climb in the Blue Ridge Savings Bank robbery/triple murder investigation.
<LI class=no_bul>Bank probe hits the streets (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030531/NEWS/305310334)

May 31, 2003
GREER -- On the two-week anniversary of a still-unsolved robbery and triple homicide, investigators took a new approach to try to crack the case.
<LI class=no_bul>Leads coming in, but no arrests yet in Greer robbery (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030530/NEWS/105300001)

May 30, 2003
GREER -- Two weeks have passed and no arrests have been made since the bank robbery that left three people dead, but Greer Police Chief Dean Crisp said investigators are still turning up new leads.
<LI class=no_bul>Security tape may show getaway car (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030528/NEWS/305280366)

May 28, 2003
GREER -- Greer Police Chief Dean Crisp hopes that security video images showing three vehicles will lead to new clues in the deadly May 16 robbery of Blue Ridge Savings Bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Greer bank an easy target (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030524/NEWS/305240353)

May 24, 2003
COLUMBIA -- The bank branch where robbers shot and killed three people last week had many vulnerabilities, security experts say.
<LI class=no_bul>2 people questioned in killings (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030523/NEWS/305230339)

May 23, 2003
GREER -- Investigators acknowledge that they are questioning two people in connection with Friday's bank robbery and triple homicide, but they're not saying much more than that.
<LI class=no_bul>Traffic stop may be a lead in bank heist (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030522/NEWS/305220317)

May 22, 2003
GREER -- Two people were in custody and being questioned Wednesday night for a possible link to Friday's bank robbery and triple slayings at Blue Ridge Savings Bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Crime scene under scrutiny (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030521/NEWS/305210342)

May 21, 2003
More than two dozen police officers combed the perimeter of the crime scene at the Blue Ridge Savings Bank Tuesday afternoon.
<LI class=no_bul>Tape from security camera missing (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030520/NEWS/305200347)

May 20, 2003
GREER -- A surveillance tape that could lead authorities to the person who killed three people at Blue Ridge Savings Bank on Friday was missing when police arrived at the scene, a source familiar with the investigation said Monday.
<LI class=no_bul>Bank employee's life was story of love (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030520/NEWS/305200346)

May 20, 2003
GREER -- Sylvia Holtzclaw was planning the refreshments for Sunday's Praise Night and was in the process of writing cards to the graduates in Greer First Baptist's youth group when she was shot to death during a robbery Friday at Blue Ridge Savings Bank.
<LI class=no_bul>Couple remembered for many kind deeds (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030520/NEWS/305200345)

May 20, 2003
James "Eb" Barnes was an educator who cared as much about his students' personal lives as he did about their grades.
<LI class=no_bul>The lives the bank robbers stole (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030518/NEWS/305180386)

May 18, 2003
James "Eb" Barnes liked to wear a Santa hat with his robe to complement his beard during winter commencement at the University of South Carolina Spartanburg.
<LI class=no_bul>Robbers took 'very little' cash (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030518/NEWS/305180384)

May 18, 2003
GREER -- The lead agent with the FBI's Greenville office said Saturday the victims of triple execution-style murders were compliant with the demands of their killers.
Spartanburg couple, Greer woman killed in bank heist (http://www.goupstate.com/article/20030517/NEWS/305170330)

May 17, 2003
GREER -- Local, state and federal authorities are searching for two suspects -- possibly in a red, midsize Chevrolet car -- who executed a teller and two customers Friday afternoon at Blue Ridge Savings Bank.

[nanabillie]

http://www.greenvilleonline.com/article/20091101/NEWS/911010331/1004/NEWS01

http://www.greenvilleonline.com/graphics/mastlogo.gif

November 1, 2009

Investigators hope someone talks to break 2003 Greer bank slaying

FBI still gets leads in 2003 Greer bank slayings

By Eric Connor
Staff WriterThe phone call David Holtzclaw received just hours after he last saw his mother alive has forever changed the life he will live.
One interwoven with loss and frustration but with hope and resolve — and one that could change for the better, he says, with just one more phone call.
Holtzclaw anxiously awaits the day when someone — anyone — can tell him and his brother who killed his mother in the Blue Ridge Savings Bank robbery that six years later remains one of the Upstate’s most inexplicable unsolved crimes.

Today, authorities say they are just as perplexed as the day they started investigating the May 2003 shooting deaths of bank teller Sylvia Holtzclaw and customers James and Margaret Barnes.
The three were the only witnesses inside the small, green bank along a dead-end frontage road off Interstate 85 and State 14 in Greer.

Thousands of leads have come in. None have panned out.
The best suspect police could develop is dead.
A break in the case, they say, likely will come only if someone decides to talk.
“I do believe this case is solvable,” said Lisa Quillen, an agent in Greenville FBI office who has been assigned to the case for the past several years. “Someone out there has information, and I believe they just haven’t come forward yet. I believe someone knows something.”

Holtzclaw hopes that’s true. He still takes time-consuming back roads to avoid the reminder of his mother’s death that sits atop a hill along I-85. He and his older brother, a Greer firefighter, talk on the phone nearly every day.
“We’re hoping that maybe somebody who does know something will all of a sudden come out and talk,” Holtzclaw said recently after returning from his mother’s favorite restaurant where he had hung fliers advertising an upcoming toy drive in her memory.
No witnesses
It wasn’t Sylvia Holtzclaw’s day to work on May 16, 2003.
David — 30 at the time and the youngest of two brothers — had planned to spend the Friday with his mother before heading back to his home in Tallahassee, Fla., after a belated Mother’s Day visit.
Sylvia had volunteered to fill in for a co-worker. She was the only employee in the bank when she was killed.
David had come to the bank to bring his mother lunch just a few hours before the panic alarm sounded around 1:30 p.m.

Police arrived 10 minutes later to find Sylvia, 56, shot to death, along with 58-year-old Margaret Barnes and her husband, 62-year-old James “Eb” Barnes, a well-known physics professor at what was then the University of South Carolina-Spartanburg.
Whoever killed them made away with “relatively little money,” said Carol Allison, an FBI agent in the Greenville office. All three showed no signs that they were anything but compliant during the robbery, she said.

The branch was less than 18 months old, the Asheville-based bank’s first foray into South Carolina.
The building was a converted mobile-home sitting atop a hill along a dead-end frontage road, today easily visible from I-85 where thousands of cars speed by, passing underneath the nearby State 14 underpass.

A VCR-style security camera was set up in the bank, but police found the tape missing.
A co-worker had left the building before the shootings. Police interviewed him, but he had little information to offer.

The closest thing investigators had to witnesses were construction workers who reported seeing a red car leaving the scene and heading back toward State 14 shortly before police arrived.

Surveillance video from a nearby Spinx gas station captured a grainy image of the car — later determined to be a red Oldsmobile Alero — going to and from the bank within a seven-minute time frame around the time of the killings.
The time frame “was tight, but doable,” said Greer Police Lt. Matt Hamby, who was once the lead investigator in the case.
The car became a central focus and the strongest lead to date — but one that has led to a dead man who if he had any clues to offer, took them to his grave.
Lead suspect dead
“It’s extremely frustrating for us, because we can’t get any information on him,” Holtzclaw said. “I want to rule him in or out, one way or the other. That is almost more frustrating than not having anything at all.”
In 2007, police sought the public’s help in providing information about a man they believed could have had a hand in the Blue Ridge Savings murders — 39-year-old Emmerson Wright.
The problem: Wright killed himself in August 2005 after fleeing police following a chase in Georgia.

A few months before, Wright escaped police during a chase in which he was driving a red Oldsmobile Alero that had been stolen from a Columbia airport two weeks before the Blue Ridge killings.
A .40 Glock was found inside. It wasn’t the same gun used in the killings, but similar.
Wright, who was from the Aiken area, had a criminal record that included convictions for burglary, aggravated assault, driving under suspension, attempting to elude police, receiving stolen property and a probation violation.

Investigators went to Wright’s home to try to get information about where he was and who he was with at the time of the Blue Ridge killings.
Very little materialized, said Greer Lt. Jimmy Holcombe.

“He is a real good suspect,” Holcombe said. “Unfortunately, a lot of the information that could have been gotten we’re not able to get because he took his life. All indications are that he basically was by himself a lot during that time frame and people can’t account for his whereabouts during that time frame.”
The investigation isn’t a matter of simply trying to confirm that Wright was involved, Quillen said.
But information that would lead elsewhere hasn’t materialized.
Not a cold case
Holtzclaw said he believes the answer could come from the place where people who might best know about such things call home.
“They keep getting leads from the jail, and we’re hoping eventually one of these leads will break into something,” he said.

One person currently in jail was looked at but later ruled out. In February 2006, police sought information about a convicted bank robber from Spartanburg, who is now serving time in federal prison.
Two weeks later, he was cleared of involvement in the Blue Ridge killings.
Police created a sketch of a man a customer said he saw in the bank earlier the day of the shootings. They determined the picture was of a North Carolina businessman who had an alibi.

Leads still trickle in but are often repetitive, Holcombe said.
“A lot of them are people that heard from somebody that heard from somebody else, a lot of ‘he said, she said’ type of things,” Holcombe said. “A lot of it is the same information coming from a different person that we’ve already followed up on.”
Still, Quillen said she believes chances are slim that someone could have committed such a crime and not talked about it.

“Believe it or not, even after all this time has passed, we still get leads on the case,” she said. “This certainly is not considered a cold case. It is very much open and active.”

[LiveLaughLuv]

Greer Police have said the robber likely used a 40 caliber handgun. Police wanted to question 39-year-old Emmerson Wright. But he took his own life two years after the Greer murders as officers in Georgia were about to arrest him.

“He is a real good suspect,” Holcombe said. “Unfortunately, a lot of the information that could have been gotten we’re not able to get because he took his life. All indications are that he basically was by himself a lot during that time frame and people can’t account for his whereabouts during that time frame.”

Surveillance video from a nearby Spinx gas station captured a grainy image of the car — later determined to be a red Oldsmobile Alero — going to and from the bank within a seven-minute time frame around the time of the killings.
The time frame “was tight, but doable,” said Greer Police Lt. Matt Hamby, who was once the lead investigator in the case.
The car became a central focus and the strongest lead to date — but one that has led to a dead man who if he had any clues to offer, took them to his grave.


Thousands of leads have come in. None have panned out.
The best suspect police could develop is dead.
A break in the case, they say, likely will come only if someone decides to talk.
“I do believe this case is solvable,” said Lisa Quillen, an agent in Greenville FBI office who has been assigned to the case for the past several years. “Someone out there has information, and I believe they just haven’t come forward yet. I believe someone knows something.”

Seems to me they already know who the suspected bank robber was and he took his own life. I wonder if they found any money with him.

Sad that crimes go unsolved but sometimes they do. It's frustrating as heck for my brothers murderer has never been brought to justice and its 27 years...

Sometimes we have to accept that something may never be solved and the main suspect has died. I know family want answers but sometimes we have only what we have...:girl_sad:

Rest in Peace

Sylvia Holtzclaw :1222423:

James and Margaret Barnes :1222423:

[nanabillie]

I am so sorry you lost your brother, I didn't know it. If I heard it, it didn't stick. I know there is nothing I can say you haven't already heard, but I am truly sorry. You are such a kind person.