Published: January 10, 2009 11:51 pm      

Cambria murder rate more than doubled in ’08

The number of murders in Cambria County more than doubled in 2008, but the final total – eight – is not unusually high, officials say.

In neighboring Somerset County, which sees few homicides, two murders took place, Coroner Wallace Miller reported.

Cambria’s numbers for 2008 were bolstered by two cases:

• Two people were slain in a double murder in June. The killer, an estranged husband, committed suicide after killing his wife and her male friend at her Cambria Township home.

• An Upper Yoder Township woman was strangled in October.

Although her body was found in Westmoreland County, it remains a Cambria County case because authorities say she was killed at her home.

Cambria Coroner Dennis Kwiatkowski said: “The numbers fluctuate all the time for us. There is no set pattern in our county.”

District Attorney Patrick Kiniry said that a few years ago, when the state police major crimes team was being formed, it appeared that the average number of homicides was five a year in Cambria.

When compared with those of some urban areas, Cambria’s numbers “are not unusual, but it’s a sad number to think that many cases ends so tragically,” Kiniry said.

The highest number in any one year since 2000 was

11 murders committed in Cambria in 2006.

And the number dropped dramatically to three in 2007.

The 11 in 2006 included murders by so-called “outsiders” who were in Cambria County – a Brooklyn, N.Y., teen who stabbed a man at the Geistown Country Club, a Huntingdon County man who kidnapped and killed a Cambria Township woman and a Philadelphia man who shot and killed an Altoona man near Blandburg.

Kwiatkowski said three factors most frequently come into play in Cambria slayings – domestic violence, drugs and the economy.

Kiniry said he believes most of the homicides are drug-related, with some stemming from domestic violence or a domestic situation.

Although the accused killers are typically charged with first-degree murder, many cases end up as third-degree murder pleas, he said.

“The fact is, we don’t have many of the premeditated, laying-in-wait type murders, which are the most heinous,” the district attorney said.

As for Somerset County, Miller said that in his experience – first as deputy coroner for 16 years and now nearly 12 years as coroner – “The vast majority of ours are homicide-suicides. It’s rare we have a ‘whodunit’ case.”

In 2008, one of the Somerset County cases involved the slaying of an 87-year-old woman suffering with Alzheimer’s disease who was shot and killed by her husband.

The 90-year-old man then committed suicide.

The previous year – 2007 – almost was one without a homicide.

There were no murders until Dec. 29, when Jeanine Downing, 33, of Somerset was shot and killed at the apartment she shared with her fiance, Bruce Emerick.

He is awaiting trial on homicide charges.



Chronicle of killings

Eight murders took place in Cambria County in 2008:

Jan. 18: Bruce Dickerson Jr., 21, of Johnstown, is stabbed once in the chest during an argument with his girlfriend, Brittany McCoy, then 17, at the Coopersdale Homes.

McCoy pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and is scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday by Judge David Tulowitzki. Prosecutors are recommending a two- to four-year state prison sentence.

April 5: Coroner Dennis Kwiatkowski rules the death of an unborn baby girl as a homicide after a coroner’s jury found that the mother, Nicole Marie Grove, 21, of Johnstown – who had died of a drug overdose – was responsible for the death of the unborn child. The mother was five months pregnant at the time. The coroner’s jury recommended that nobody should be held criminally responsible for the drug overdose of the woman even through her husband told police he had bought the drugs.

April 27: Cortez Jordan, 27, of Ferndale, is shot twice – once in the chest and once in the head around

2 a.m. outside the Solomon Homes, where Jordan had rushed to check on his sister there.

Norris Collins Jr., the alleged shooter who fled the scene, rejected a plea deal for third-degree murder last week. He now faces trial Feb. 9 for first-degree murder in the slaying.

June 29: Debra Gerlach, 41, and Paul Demetri, 44, of Maryland, are shot to death in her Cambria Township home.

Authorities said that they were killed by Gerlach’s estranged husband, David, who killed himself after shooting the woman and man. The Gerlachs were going through a divorce proceeding in Cambria County Court.

Oct. 19: The body of Anna Phillips, 85, of Upper Yoder Township, is found on state gamelands just west of the Cambria County line in Westmoreland County. Upper Yoder police alleged that the elderly woman had been killed by her son, Frederick, 51, at her Cambria County home.

The son, who was arrested in West Virginia after his pickup wrecked there, is charged with first-degree murder in the strangulation death. He faces a formal county court arraignment Jan. 20 by Judge Norman Krumenacker.

Nov. 10: Luke Debose, 67, shoots his wife, Barbara, 65, in their home along Columbia Street in Upper Yoder Township, according to police. After a brief standoff with police, Luke Dubose turned the gun on himself, police said. Kwiatkowski ruled the deaths a murder-suicide.

Nov. 26: Erick Melius, 28, of Belsano, is found dead at his Blacklick Township home, two days after having been beaten in an encounter with a group of hunters in neighboring Indiana County. Kwiatkowski ruled the death a homicide, saying that Melius died of blunt-force trauma to the neck. Stephen Charles Shesko, 60, of Seward, formerly of Johnstown, who was with the hunters, is facing charges of criminal homicide and aggravated assault in Indiana County. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Feb. 10 before District Judge Susanne Steffee of Homer City.

• • •

Somerset County had two murders in 2008, with one a murder-suicide.

March 4: Body of Rosalie Walker, 87, found the afternoon of March 4 on the floor of an attached garage at her home in Somerset Township. On the floor nearby was her mortally wounded husband, John, 90, who died before emergency medical responders arrived at the scene.

Authorities said that Walker shot and killed his wife before turning the gun on himself. Both died from gunshot wounds to the head. Rosalie Walker, who had been staying at a nearby personal-care home, suffered from Alzheimer’s disease and other health problems. Her husband had brought her home for a visit.

June 9: Ralph Peck, 47, of Somerset, is found dead around 6:30 a.m. by a man walking his dog near a barn in Somerset Township. Authorities said that Peck and his homosexual lover, Ronald R. Miller, had been in a fight early that morning, before Miller allegedly pushed Peck from a barn ramp at the farm where Miller lives. Coroner Wallace Miller said that Peck had fallen about

7 feet and died from a head injury. Miller, 46, of Friedens, was charged with criminal homicide in the death. On Dec. 19, Miller pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and is to be sentenced March 6 by Judge John Cascio.