In 1981, a suspect was arrested, charged and tried in an unsolved murder case from 1977. The result of the trial was that the individual was acquitted.
At the end of March 1977, Mrs. Jennie E. Barr, an elderly widow, was found dead in her den in her home in Tremont, Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. The cause of death was strangulation and she was also sexually assaulted. Investigators ruled the death a homicide.
This murder was the first of four that occurred in the Lykens Valley area in a less than three-year period between 1977 and 1979 – all of elderly widows.. To this day, none of the four murders have been solved.
The story of the arrest, charging and trial is told here in a 12 part series through articles published in the Pottsville Republican.
From the Pottsville Republican, 19 February 1981:
’77: A town obsessed by murder
TREMONT – The murder of 78-year-old Jennie E. Barr here four years ago left many persons in this community in a frightened and suspicious state for months after the killing.
“I’ve never seen anything like this. It was the work of an animal… a maniac,” a source close to the investigation commented after an autopsy revealed the brutal manner of Mrs. Barr’s death.
The town became obsessed with the murder. An extra policeman was hired and the Lions Club formed a “Night Walk Committee” consisting of two-man teams that patrolled the streets at night.
“We want people to know that we’re there if they think Tremont is an easy mark,” a member of the club said a month after the killing.
Some elderly residents who lived alone, as Mrs. Barr had, either moved in with relatives or had relatives move in with them temporarily.
Several even moved away and put their home for sale.
Police Chief Elmer S. Cutler noted that the members of the borough police force “didn’t sleep for six days” following Mrs. Barr’s death on March 30.
“Almost everyone in town had a loaded gun. I have one upstairs and downstairs,” one borough resident commented during the days soon after the murder.
Suspicion such as that normally found only in large cities became common. “People won’t even go up to a house and knock on a door unless they’ve called ahead to say they’re coming,” a woman said.
Children were told to come in earlier than normal. “You can’t even sit on the corners in this town since the incident,” a boy complained after the murder.
Of Mrs. Barr, a merchant said, “I don’t know of anybody who had anything against her. She never did anything to anyone.”
A friend had apparently been trying to reach her all day on March 31, 1977, and finally phoned a neighbor when Mrs. Barr did not answer the phone. A neighbor went to the house to check on her that night and discovered her body in a first-floor den. Police said yesterday that they still do not know of a motive for the killing.
Mrs. Barr was the widow of Dr. Guy L. Barr, a Tremont osteopath, who died in 1964. A lifelong resident of the borough, she was the daughter of the late Joseph Frymoyer and Ellen [Newton] Frymoyer.
She was active with many groups in community ventures and at the time of her death had been working on preparations for a Red Cross Bloodmobile visit.
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For all other parts of this story, see: A Trial & An Acquittal, 1981.
For all parts of the story of the murder, see: Who Killed Jennie E. Barr?
News clipping/article from Newspapers.com.
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