This week Grave Secrets examines the tragic case of Marcia Trimble, who went missing while selling cookies and was never seen alive again.
February, 1975, in Nashville, Tennessee, and 9-year-old Marcia Trimble was out delivering some Girl Scout Cookies in the upmarket area of Green Hills, she’d never return home or be seen alive again.
Local police were joined by the state police and the FBI in what the latter thought might be a kidnapping case, but sadly 33 days after she disappeared the body of Marcia was discovered. She was discovered in a garage and had been strangled, although she was fully clothed it was soon determined she’d been sexually assaulted.
The first person to come under suspicion was 15-year-old Jeffery Womack, who lived near Marcia and was thought to be one of the last people to see her. She’d called at his house to sell cookies but he told police that he’d not had enough cash to buy any and had sent her away.
When he found out that she was missing, he went straight to the police who questioned him without a lawyer present. Cash in his pockets seemed to contradict what he’d told them and he also had a condom.
This all convinced some investigators that he was guilty and when he lawyered up they were even more suspicious. They even tried to gather evidence using undercover police to befriend him when he was working in a restaurant.
Watch the Latest on our YouTube ChannelEventually in 1980 they arrested him for murder but the charges were dismissed.
DNA samples from the semen on Marcia’s body failed to match Womack or nearly 100 other men who were tested and the case went cold.
It would not be until June 6, 2008, that 60-year-old Jerome Sydney Barrett was charged with first-degree murder. He was found guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced to 44 years in prison.
Grave Secrets airs at 2 P.M. on Investigation Discovery.