First of all Hope Lashae Calhoun has been found safe. She was in Los Angeles with her boyfriend, Alexander Clay Qualls. She was considered endangered because of her last text message to her parents had an ominous “goodbye” sound to it.
This Saturday, America’s Most Wanted will feature the Short family murders. This case has haunted southwest Virginia for a long time. We need it solved!
Tammy L. Thorpe Murder
From the Fauquier County Sheriff’s Office website:
Tammy was found shot to death on October 23, 1988 shortly after 7 am off a gravel road, approximately ¼ mile outside the Warrenton town limits on the northbound side of Route 17. Tammy, who was20 years old at the time of her death, was last seen around 3 am in Warrenton driving her 1986 two door, gold Pontiac Grand Am with Virginia registration 86-TAMMY. The State Medical Examiner determined that Tammy had died of multiple gunshot wounds. Evidence recovered by the investigating team indicates a small caliber handgun was involved. A 1986 Fauquier High School graduate, Tammy was working as a secretary in Marshall at the time of her death.
The Sheriff’s Office has followed up on hundreds of leads over the past years. Several suspects have been developed but no arrests have been made. Over the past years detectives from the Criminal Investigation Division have been going back over the volumes of information, leads, and reports. Evidence was resubmitted to the forensic lab for re-evaluation and examination.
The original team of investigators had the case profiled by the FBI at Quantico, Virginia. The profile concludes Tammy’s assailant was most probably a white male who lives in Fauquier County and knew her. Experts at the National Center are still convinced that Tammy was not killed by a stranger but by someone she knew. At the time of the killing in 1988, the perpetrator was most likely exhibiting signs of great psychological stress and had to internalize his anger and frustration over this senseless crime. He is still likely to be thinking about it today and haunted by dreams of what happened.
Anyone with any information is asked to call the Sheriff’s Office, Criminal Investigation Division, at (540) 347-6870.
