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N r GIVING UPRon Riucnhousc/Thc Dominion PostRod Everly inspects a dig site in the recently reopened 1970 cold case of murdered WVU students Mared Malarik and Karen Ferrell. On Wednesday, adrenaline was high as searchers thought they may have located the missing heads of the two women. Though it ended up being a large rock, searchers were not deterred and will continue searching the area where the skulls are thought to be buried.Searchers persevere in 1970 cold case of murdered coedsBY JIM BISSETTJ Bissett@DominionPost.comAt a wooded, rural site near Morgantown on Wednesday afternoon, Michael Kief spent several minutes staring into the abyss.It was in the form of geometric hole, some 4 feet deep, that the former West Virginia State Police lieutenant hopes will yield some final answers to a murder case which has chilled and intrigued the Morgantown community for more than 50 years.Kief worked on a number of cold cases involving forensic investigation during his career.He was quickly hired back by State Police as a civilian employee in that discipline following his recent retirement.Ironically, this opening in the earth he was examining looked like it could have been for a grave.It could still very well be.On a cold January evening in 1970, WVU freshmen and friends Karen Ferrell and Mared Malarik were hitching a ride back to their dorm after catching a movie downtown.Their decomposed, decapitated bodies were discovered four months later by a West Virginia National Guard unit.State Police, leading the investigation after the friends failed to show in their dorm or for class, was acting in part from a series of anonymous letters.The letters said this particular area — in the same general expanse where Kief was standing Wednesday -would be the area where the two victims would be found.A half-century later, their heads have yet to be located.For the past two weeks, he and his fellow investigators have been meticulously chipping away the soil and rock.Underneath it all, those investigators now believe, is also where the missing remains might ultimately be found.Bone fragments. Maybe even (almost) intact skulls - depending upon the whims of a half-century of elements and strata.The area was extensively renovated in the years after the investigation and initial discoveryThat’s m ak in g si ow,thoughtful work even more so, as metric tons of fill dirt, rock and sand have been layered unto the mix.Investigators have uncovered a scrap of cloth in recent days, along with a spent pull-tab from a long-ago beer can.Broken glass from other beer bottles and two spent, small-caliber bullets, also.'Looking at it every way, and any way you can’Before the earth was evenSEE GIVING, A 2
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Morgantown Dominion Post
Morgantown, West Virginia, US
Thu, Jun 02, 2022
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USA 20 Oct 2022
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