Divers look for murder weapon

Police were continuing to search Beams Lake at Elizabeth yesterday, hoping to recover a gun and other items used in connection with last week’s murder of a Jeffersonville woman.
Also, police hope to recover a vehicle stolen two days prior to the Jeffersonville murder, thought to have been driven into the lake by the murder suspects.
Lt. Randy Orme of the Harrison County Sheriff’s Dept. said the vehicle, a black Ford Mustang, belongs to one of two men from near Ashland, Ky., who gave a ride to the suspects from a club in Louisville to a home on Smith Campground Road, Elizabeth.
Once there, the Louisville men apparently went inside the house where one was tied up with duct tape, cut and struck with a machine gun. The two men were later forced outside at gunpoint and told to get in the trunk of their Ford, but the two escaped and ran to a nearby house.

Residents called 9-1-1 and police arrived about 2:15 p.m., but the suspects had left the area.

They are thought to be the three male suspects in the Jeffersonville murder: James Daily Jr., 19; Troy Green, 21, and Joshua Shireman, 20, all of Corydon. They, along with Sara Mills, 17, Elizabeth, are in custody at the Clark County Jail. Bond has not been set.

Jeffersonville police said the suspects said they threw the gun in the lake.

Harrison County police detective Lt. Roy Wiseman said divers at Beams Lake believe they have recovered the magazine from the gun used to strike 73-year-old Virginia Walker in the head. Death, though, was by strangulation.
The black Ford Mustang was located about 70 feet deep in the lake last Wednesday by the diver, Harrison County police Capt. Richard Bauman. As of yesterday, the vehicle was still submerged.
Several other items were recovered yesterday, said Det. Roy Wiseman of the Harrison County Sheriff’s Dept.
Harrison County Prosecutor Ronald W. Simpson said he will file charges, possibly confinement, battery and theft, against the murder suspects once the investigation is complete.