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1962 Selby, Bernice 12/18/62; Lake Cassidy ( 28 Yr)
Topic Started: Jul 19 2006, 12:29 PM (766 Views)
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Tuesday, November 28, 1995


6 Years Later, Informer Tells Of Woman's Slaying

Peter Routman

Seattle Times Snohomish County Bureau

EVERETT - Thirty-three years ago, Bernice Selby vanished. She was never seen again.

The case was closed long ago. But two months ago, a man came forward who said he knew what really happened to the 28-year-old woman: She was slain by her husband, and her body was buried under a road in Everett.

That information was enough to send investigators from the Snohomish County sheriff's office and Everett Police Department out to the 6300 block of 97th Drive Northeast last week armed with shovels and pitchforks. The investigation was made public yesterday.

Officials used a backhoe to remove a 12-foot span of the road and then dug about 30 inches to the bottom of a culvert running under the road, said Scott Stensen, a road maintenance supervisor for the county's Public Works Department.

They didn't find anything, but authorities now think that Selby was slain.

"The ideal thing would have been if we had found her," said Jan Jorgensen, spokeswoman for the sheriff's office. "It is possible we could have missed it."

Selby, who lived on the shore of Lake Cassidy east of Marysville, was reported missing Dec. 18, 1962 by her sister, Sylvia Smith.

Selby's 30-year-old husband, Donald Selby, immediately became a person of interest in the case. He was never charged.

According to newspaper accounts, Donald Selby, an aircraft sheet-metal worker, had filed for divorce seven months before his wife's disappearance, and the divorce was granted in May 1963.

In the spring of 1963, detectives obtained a search warrant for Selby's residence. Bone fragments were uncovered in a pasture near the home, but the FBI later determined they were animal bones.

Divers dragged the waters of Lake Cassidy three times, but no evidence was found.

The case remained inactive until this September, when an acquaintance of Donald Selby called sheriff's Detective Jim Haley. The man said Selby had admitted to striking his wife with his fist, knocking her into a fireplace where she hit her head and died.

The man said Selby told him he buried her body next to a culvert under a road that was scheduled to be paved.

The sheriff's office wouldn't reveal the informer's identity, but said he passed a polygraph test. A second informer gave the same information, Jorgensen said.

"Apparently, this had been really bothering this person," Jorgensen said. "He said he just wanted to get it off his mind."

But if Donald Selby was a killer, he carried his secret to his grave. He died as a result of the Mount St. Helens eruption in 1980 and was found dead in a burned-out camper.

Copyright © 1995 Seattle Times Company, All Rights Reserved.
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http://z10.invisionfree.com/usedtobedoe/in...?showtopic=4783
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I'd love to get a photo of this lady.
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http://www.olywa.net/radu/valerie/mshvictims.html
Donald listed as victim at Mount St Helens
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