Shyanne Somers was just 12 years old.
She was supposed to babysit for the children of George Ford, Jr., but his wife Cindy returned home early and she wasn't needed. So George drove her home.
He told police that he had taken her, shortly after midnight, to see his horses in a nearby town. He said that she was outside of the car and that he accidentally ran over her while turning his pickup truck around. It took him two hours to get her to the hospital via a round-about route - he told authorities that he had gotten lost.
As things stood, he probably faced no worse than a reckless endangerment charge.
But then wife Cindy came forward. Suspicious that her husband was having an affair, she had placed a GPS tracking device in her husband's truck the day before Shyanne was murdered.
The GPS evidence showed that George had gone in a direction opposite from where his horses were. He spent about three hours behind an abandoned farmhouse with Shyanne. With that evidence, investigators were able to determine that Shyanne had gotten away from George and fled down the road, where George ran her over. The GPS device gave irrefutable evidence of George's route that night.
Since authorities were unable to prove that a sexual assault had taken place, it will never be known what happened to Shyanne behind the farmhouse. Only that she fled, and that George silenced the only witness by murdering her. He was convicted of second degree murder in February.
He will be sentenced in May. I hope for a very long time.
E-mail: snelson@senseient.com Phone: 703-359-0700
