Six dead, missing women draw investigators to rural Ohio county
By Steve Bittenbender
(Reuters) - Authorities made a public appeal on Thursday for help to determine why four women have died and two disappeared from a small southern Ohio county in little more than a year.
At least some of the women, all Chillicothe, Ohio-area residents, were believed to be drug users, possibly drawn into prostitution to support their addiction, authorities said.
The latest one to be found dead was discovered in a creek on Saturday, according to law-enforcement officials, who said six women dead or missing is an unusually high number for Ross County, which has a population of less than 80,000.
"We are putting every resource that we have available, all the manpower that we have available to find out what's going on," Lieutenant Mike Preston, spokesman for the Ross County Sheriff's Office, said in a telephone interview.
The cases have raised fears among residents of a possible serial killer, according to the Chillicothe Gazette. Authorities have not ruled out the possibility, or confirmed it in the county 50 miles south of Ohio's capital of Columbus.
"The investigation has not produced any evidence that one person or persons are responsible," Preston told Reuters in an email. "Heroin addiction and prostitution to support the addiction has come up in the investigation."
Since May 2014, Tameka Lynch, Shasta Himelrick, Timberly Claytor and Tiffany Sayre have been found dead after being reported missing. Charlotte Trego and Wanda Lemons were reported missing and remain unaccounted for.
Authorities circulated a flyer with pictures of the six women on Thursday, asking for any information about them.
The deaths of Sayre and Claytor are being investigated as homicides. Sayre was last seen in Chillicothe in May and her body was found on Saturday in a creek in an adjoining county, while Claytor's body was found in May in Ross County.
A man being held on separate charges has been identified as a suspect in Claytor's death and is not suspected in the deaths or other disappearances, Preston said.
A task force looking into the cases includes investigators from the Chillicothe police, Ross County, state agencies and the FBI, Preston said.
While the deaths of Lynch and Himelrick have not been classified as homicides, officials said the women had some things in common with the others. They did not elaborate.
(Reporting by Steve Bittenbender in Louisville, Kentucky; Editing by David Bailey and Mohammad Zargham)
