http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=...id=439676&rfi=6'I don't want to let her down'
By Tiffiny Woo 03/06/2008
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Judith Henton remembers the evening of March 10, 1987 vividly. The recently divorced mother of three watched with pride as her baby girl, 17-year-old Cynthia Michelle Dykes, dressed for a dinner date with her boyfriend and his parents.
"She was beautiful," Henton recalls tearfully. "She bought some new make up and fixed her hair so beautifully. She wore my sweater. It was one that she had bought me as a gift."
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Cindy left the house that evening around 5 p.m., promising her mother she'd return around 11 p.m. But Cindy Dykes never made her curfew.
"My son woke me up around 1 a.m. (on March 11) with news that he had found Cindy's car abandoned with a flat tire," Henton said in a recent interview with The Tribune. The car was found on Hwy. 30 approximately eight miles from Clayton. Judith and a friend drove around the area throughout the night searching for her daughter.
"There's something like a mother's intuition just telling me that something wasn't right," she said.
After a long night of searching for her daughter, Henton finally returned home to check with local police.
She was later informed by her parents that Cindy's body had been found on Robertson Mill Road, better known today as Dan Snead Road off of Hwy. 51 connecting Clayton and Louisville.
The coroner's initial report, and later an autopsy performed by specialists in Montgomery, stated that Dykes was choked using the wide collar of her sweater before being beaten and smothered in the dirt lining the road.
"On March 11, 1987, I made a vow to never give up trying to find out who did this," Henton said. "I won't give up."
Twenty-one years after the death of the 17-year-old Clayton resident, the unsolved murder case has been reopened by Barbour County Sheriff's Department.
The murder is being revisited with the help of a new cold case division of the State Attorney General's office.
Sheriff Leroy Upshaw says that after a meeting with Attorney General Troy King and the victim's mother, Judith Henton, the evidence is being reviewed with assistance from the AG's office.
Henton describes her daughter as energetic, an outgoing tomboy with many friends.
"She loved her little car," said Henton. "She worked to pay for it herself and was so proud of it. She could have changed the flat tire herself if the jack had been in it. I don't think she would have gotten into a stranger's car that night unless she was forced."
The Louisville Police Department, Barbour County Sheriff's Office, District Attorney's Office and Alabama Bureau of Investigations contributed to the murder investigation.
On Feb. 2, 1989, authorities arrested Chris Thompson, Cindy's boyfriend and date for the night, and charged him with murder.
Four months later, a jury declared Thompson innocent of the crime, leaving the case unresolved.
"At first I would hear that it was going to take time (for the investigation), and then, eventually, I would hear that too much time had passed," said Henton. "No matter how much time passes, the hurt never goes away, especially not knowing what happened to my baby," she adds through her tears.
Speaking with King about the case has given Henton a renewed hope to see justice done for her daughter. Her determination doesn't stem from wanting vengeance on the murderer, but from a sense of loyalty to her daughter's memory.
"I don't want to let her down," she said. "She wouldn't have let me down. I just want to know that everything that could be done has been done."
It's a sense of closure and not necessarily an answer that Henton seeks in the reopening of the case.
Upshaw says reopening the case has been something he has been interested in since he was a deputy for the department.
"I was younger (than Cindy) but I remember when it happened and I've always wanted to find out what happened," said Upshaw.
The sheriff adds that he was recently given new information on the case, which prompted him to seek out help from the AG's office.
He says opening the case will involve locating evidence and re-analyzing all factors in the investigation.
"We've come a long way in forensics since then," Upshaw said. "There was some forensic evidence in this case that could lead to something.
"I don't know if it will ever be solved but it's my duty to look into it."
Upshaw urges anyone with information pertaining to the case to contact the sheriff's department at (334) 775-1103.
ŠEufaula Tribune 2008