The Savage Murder of Skylar Neese: The Truth Behind the Headlines

by Berry, Daleen

  Dave’s trip to the capitol was successful, as Skylar’s Law was overwhelmingly popular with the legislators.

  Chapter 30

  Skylar Neese Is Dead

  Gaskins couldn’t get Skylar Neese out of his mind. He kept replaying the day they had found her and the one thing he felt they had left undone. The crime scene unit had been on site for nearly forty-eight hours after they found the remains. Gaskins, several other state troopers, and FBI agents had carefully sifted, bagged, and tagged anything that might contain clues to how this person—who Gaskins was convinced was Skylar—died. Or who might have been responsible. But they hadn’t found the head.

  For almost two months, Gaskins’s thoughts kept coming back to that. He had since moved on to other cases. But his mind was locked on her missing head. By early March temperatures had climbed to the sixties. When First Sergeant Chad Tierney asked Gaskins to take him out to see the site, Gaskins jumped at the opportunity.

  As he drove, Gaskins and Tierney talked about the case. He also thought a lot about Skylar. Most likely, scavengers were responsible for the head being missing. Gaskins knew bodies that are left outdoors for months are always victimized a second time—first comes the death and then the ravages of time, weather, and wildlife. In earlier cases Gaskins had worked, he’d found bones as much as a quarter mile or farther from the victim’s body.

  He also thought about how Rachel’s confession had taken him completely by surprise. He and Berry had known for months that Shelia and Rachel were withholding, but they never believed the teens had stabbed their friend to death. Upon learning that, he realized that the bank robberies were completely unconnected to the murder.

  The lack of real evidence, coupled with Rachel’s confession, took the pressure off the Conaway boys. They ceased being primary suspects. Gaskins couldn’t see any reason for their involvement. And he had even begun to wonder how the rumors about Dylan and Darek arose in the first place. Had someone deliberately started them to draw law enforcement’s eyes away from Shelia and Rachel?

  When they arrived at the site, Gaskins showed Tierney the place where they found Skylar. Then he led the way up a little road that was more like a footpath than one that vehicles would travel. It curved around the mountain and led up to a pond. Gaskins told Tierney about the mine shafts he and Berry had searched, and about the T-shirt they found.

  The two troopers were walking back down the road when Gaskins glanced over. As he scanned the field, he saw something glinting in the sunlight. “Man, that doesn’t look right.”

  Gaskins and Tierney kept walking. “It might be the skull,” Tierney told him.

  “It can’t be that easy.”

  But it was. As they drew near, they could tell it was a human head. Gaskins couldn’t believe it. He was so excited he could barely find the right screen on his phone to call Berry.

  “Grab my camera. Grab my crime scene stuff. Get out here right now.”

  ***

  Berry had to restrain himself as he drove the familiar route. He knew the road so well, he could easily drive much faster than the speed limit. But he tried not to. Still, Gaskins was waiting. And Skylar—all of Skylar—could be returned to Dave and Mary.

  When Berry arrived, he took photos from every angle. They bagged the skull and took it to the Greene County coroner.

  ***

  When the terrible news about Skylar finally came, on Wednesday, March 13, it didn’t come from the state crime lab. Nor was it really news to Mary and Dave, or to any of the people closest to the case. They had known since February that the body was most likely Skylar’s, and they had shared the news with many of her friends. But on March 13, an impatient public finally learned the truth, too: the remains found in Pennsylvania on January 16 were those of Skylar Neese.

  However, instead of coming from Charleston, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Wheeling made the announcement, not the Morgantown Detachment of the West Virginia State Police. That small detail suggests the FBI was directly involved in Skylar’s identification. It partly explained why the process had taken so long. But the four-sentence press release explained little else.

  ***

  Even though Rachel had confessed to the murder in early January, only her legal counsel, the prosecutor’s office, and law enforcement knew this. Mary and Dave had not been informed, even though they already suspected that Shelia and Rachel had killed their daughter. Officially, they were not told. Still, the news made its way back to them.

  Daniel was painfully aware that Skylar was gone. Mary had broken the news to him about the remains in a Facebook message back in February, and Skylar’s close friend had been absolutely heartbroken. He had not yet been told of Rachel’s confession, either, but when he was told it looked like her remains had been located, he knew immediately who was responsible.

  Daniel’s world was falling apart, so he did the only thing he could do to cope with the intense level of pain he felt for Skylar: he went home, locked himself in his bedroom, and lit up a joint. Then he cried and cried—for days on end.

  ***

  Skylar’s other childhood friend, Hayden McClead, heard the same time Daniel did, back in February. Her mother, Katrina, and Mary were close, so when Katrina learned the news from Mary, she told Hayden. For the next month, Hayden’s world was suspended in silent grief. Never having faced something this awful before, she simply didn’t know how to feel. While she had been told Skylar was dead, she didn’t want to believe it. She continued to go to class, suspended in a cloud of numbness and denial—until March 13.

  Hayden was listening to her chemistry teacher’s lecture during fourth period when she felt her phone vibrate. Someone had sent her a message on Facebook. R u ok? The words confused her. She wondered what they meant and why anyone would be worried about her. Just then, her mom’s picture appeared on Hayden’s cell phone screen. Hayden left the classroom to take the call, worried that something bad must have happened.

  Katrina broke the news to her daughter as gently as she could: Skylar’s body had been definitively identified. Hayden could no longer ignore the truth. Still, she was so shocked when the reality set in, she could barely speak. One singular thought kept repeating inside her head: Shelia and Rachel did it.

  ***

  Across the county, Shania Ammons’s volleyball coach pulled her from class to deliver the news in person. Shania was so upset that she walked out of Clay-Battelle High School and went straight home. But first, she texted Shelia with the news. She was sure Shelia would want to know what had happened to her best friend.

  Shania said that neither she nor Shelia cried that day. She didn’t think it odd, though; they had already cried themselves out when Skylar first disappeared.

  Back at the home she shared with her grandparents, Shania told her grandmother the news and said that she was headed over to Shelia’s.

  “If you’re going, then I’m going,” Linda said. The slender but forceful grandmother wouldn’t let Shania go by herself, because Linda had her own suspicions about Shelia.

  “My family didn’t believe her story,” Shania said, “and they tried really, really hard to keep me away from Shelia. It was a constant fight, an every-single-day fight. But I still hung out with Shelia. They didn’t keep me away from her.”

  Ironically, on that March 13, Shania and Linda already had plans to join Shelia and Tara for dinner. So they all went to Martin’s Bar-b-que Joint in Morgantown together. Shania remembers the meal being sad and awkward.

  Shania said Shelia asked her who she thought had committed the murder. Shania answered honestly.

  “I don’t know.”

  ***

  The high school cafeteria could be called a precursor to today’s social media sites, a hotbed for the same kind of gossip and innuendo that pops up on Facebook, Twitter, and Websleuths. Many students first heard rumors about Skylar’s murder in the lunchroom—some true, some false. One particularly disturbing rumor began floating around after Skylar’s body was found
, but long before Rachel and Shelia were arrested.

  This dark story especially affected Jordan Carter. She had never given up hope that her onetime summer playmate would come home. Perhaps because the color purple was used at Skylar-themed events after she disappeared, Jordan would think of Skylar every day when she drove home from school past a local bar called the Purple Cow Lounge. Jordan was always looking at the faces of people she passed—hoping one of them might just be her missing friend.

  After the news broke about a body being found, Jordan was sitting at a table inside the UHS cafeteria when she overheard someone say something that caught her attention.

  “You know Rachel and Shelia killed her, right?” one teen asked another. “You know they cut off her head and dumped her in the woods.”

  Jordan was speechless with horror.

  Chapter 31

  The Close of the Day

  Patricia arranged Rachel’s good-bye tour for the last half of April, when she and Rusty took their daughter to Virginia Beach.

  When people heard about it after Rachel pled guilty on May 1, the online discussion boards lit up. Busybodies who knew nothing beyond the pics and Rachel’s tweets characterized it as a last mother-daughter fling. Other people questioned the competence of the authorities charged with investigating and prosecuting the case.

  They did so because police already knew Rachel was guilty when she took that trip. She had confessed, and passed an extensive polygraph exam afterward. So why authorities let Rachel leave the state is unclear. It may be she was still free to travel reasonable distances from her home. It could also be that she wasn’t considered a flight risk. The truth will come out in post-trial interviews.

  But despite the public’s perceptions, the trip was taken for one reason: so Rachel could say good-bye to her maternal grandparents, who lived in Virginia Beach. Because Rachel’s arrest was imminent, the Shoafs knew she wasn’t going to see her grandparents for a long time, if ever again.

  The online community’s reaction to the Virginia Beach trip once again highlights social media’s uncertain connections to the truth. For instance, Rachel’s tweet sunday is the day when me and my mom get drunk together and its a great time made their beach trip sound like one nonstop party. In truth, this tweet occurred after Patricia let Rachel have a sip of her mimosa. Rachel’s tweet was for one purpose only—to make her mother angry. She succeeded.

  All through the late winter and early spring, Rachel had been trying to shore up her image as a happy innocent for her friends, her fans, and the strangers who were becoming more curious about her. She said that once her name was cleared, she was moving to Canada or England, where no one knew the rumors and she could study acting. Once, she simply tweeted, i just cant wait to get the hell out of here and start a completely new life.

  Some of Rachel’s tweets seemed manufactured, as if they were designed to portray her days as normal—when instead they masked her hidden life. On January 16, for instance, she tweeted, my life is beyond boring right now. Rachel just wanted people to think she was no different than she ever had been.

  Rachel’s other tweets held a ring of denial and exhausted depression: can i sleep til im 18 then wake up? that’d be perfect and i can’t remember what’s a dream and what’s reality anymore.

  But sometimes, like someone hiding behind a translucent window sheer, reality has a way of becoming visible. This happened on February 10, when Rachel tweeted, happy birthday skylar. Later that same night, she tweeted, i hate the shit i think about at night. And the next day, she seemed to be shaking off her dark thoughts: yeah, there are plenty of things i regret from my past. but im on a completely new path now and i really wish people could appreciate that. Amidst all of this, Rachel had to face constant harassment, some of which she responded to reasonably (seriously why can’t you guys just mind your own business) and some with a burst of anger (GOD I HATE YOU GO AWAY).

  She did receive occasional support from a friend or two (@_racchh rumors are rumors and that’s all they will ever be, people who matter won’t believe them anyways!). Some of Rachel’s friends believed the teenager just couldn’t have done anything so heinous as kill one of her bffs. Other friends simply thought the legal system accorded her the same right as everyone else: namely, that she should be viewed as innocent until proven guilty.

  Rachel tweeted fairly regularly about her life with Mikinzy. There was her January 13 so proud :’) @mikinzyboggs tweet. And two weeks later, on January 29: mikinzy is so fun to talk to cause he’s so curious about life and how people think. Rachel seemed to value the relationship, and in early March she even tweeted thank god i have a reliable boyfriend lol seriously.

  Unbeknownst to Rachel, Mikinzy wouldn’t be hers much longer. By the time Rachel pled guilty to second-degree murder, they had broken up for good.

  ***

  As it wove its way through the legislative process, Skylar’s Law came up for a vote in each chamber. Each time it passed unanimously.

  When he heard the news, Dave called Mary immediately.

  “It passed! It passed the House 98–0 and the Senate 34–0,” Dave told his grieving wife.

  Governor Earl Ray Tomblin approved the legislation on April 29, his signature transforming one angry mother’s late-night Facebook rant into Skylar’s Law. Governor Tomblin didn’t know it, but with his official seal on the new law, he gave the Neeses the only happy ending they would ever have. Skylar’s Law is now being used as a model by several other states to help reform their own AMBER Alert systems. The reform stands to provide a beacon of hope for parents of present and future missing children.

  And one day later, four long months after Rachel’s confession, Shelia Eddy and Rachel Shoaf were taken into custody.

  ***

  Rachel had been crying when she turned herself in to the state police on April 30. Patricia and Rusty were with her, as was Angotti. Gaskins met them all at the Morgantown Detachment, so it wasn’t as difficult as it might have been if the teenage girl had to face a stranger. Still, Gaskins had spent a long day processing her and arranging custodial responsibilities. Finally, with Rachel in custody, Gaskins was ready to close the final chapter on this case. Chris Berry was in the office they shared when Gaskins dialed Tara’s number.

  Tara’s voice came on the line after only one ring, “Aren’t you finished harassing us yet?”

  Gaskins let his head fall forward, shaking it in frustration. “I’m afraid not, Tara. We have a few more questions for Shelia.”

  “She’s right here. Will this take long? We’ve got things to do.”

  “This needs to be in person,” Gaskins said. “We could come to you, or you could bring her by the Detachment.”

  “We’re at Cracker Barrel right now, finishing up dinner. We can be there in, say, half an hour.”

  “That would be fine. See you then.”

  As soon as he hung up, Gaskins stood up and grabbed his hat. Without a word, Berry was right behind him.

  Tara keyed off her cell and looked at Shelia as she waved at the waitress. “We need to go.”

  “I’m not even done!” Shelia whined without glancing up from her cell.

  “Yes, you are,” Tara snapped. She finally caught the waitress’s eye, and the girl hurried over. She wasn’t much older than Shelia.

  “Will that be—”

  “Just give us our check.” Tara was already digging through her purse for her wallet. “Shelia! I said let’s go!”

  “What’s with you, Mom? You don’t have to go all psycho on me.” She tweeted her reaction to her Mom’s urgency: ugh y, an expression of exasperation.

  Little did Shelia know that short tweet would also be her last.

  Instead of paying at the register, Tara threw some cash on the table and, expecting Shelia to keep up with her, quickly headed for the exit. Why Tara was in such a hurry is unclear. Given all the times she’d claimed that police were harassing her daughter, she probably wasn’t rushing her daughter to a police interview
.

  Mother and daughter came out the front door of Cracker Barrel, making a beeline around the side of the building toward their car. They stopped short. A state police car was blocking them in. Doors on opposite sides of the cruiser opened simultaneously, and out stepped Gaskins and Berry.

  Chapter 32

  Drive

  Gaskins and Colebank both wanted the job, and they both got it: they drove Shelia to her new home at the Lorrie Yeager Jr. Juvenile Center in Parkersburg, West Virginia. If Shelia didn’t plead out like Rachel had done, she was going to face a trial that would wreak even more havoc on the people around her. Gaskins and Berry, Colebank and Spurlock, had already expended a great deal of effort interviewing dozens of people about Skylar’s disappearance and murder. The ones they had spent the most time on, the Conaway boys, were both entirely innocent of any connection to the murder. All of Shelia’s and Rachel’s friends and family would probably be dealing with the fallout of the murder for their entire lives. Naturally, so would Skylar’s.

  Shelia’s arraignment hearing had been brief, less than thirty minutes, but because she was underage, no one in the public even knew about it. The public had only learned that an unnamed juvenile was facing charges related to Skylar’s murder, and she was in custody. That girl was Shelia, which a great many people had already concluded, thanks to details released after Rachel pled guilty to second-degree murder.

  Judge Russell M. Clawges, Jr., presided over Rachel’s May 1 plea hearing and ruled that the teen did understand her actions when she pled guilty.

  By the time the proceeding ended ninety minutes later, Mary and Dave Neese had finally learned the answer to the single most important question of the last ten months: What had happened to their daughter?