Fifty years ago there was a crazy man in Gaffney, S.C., who kidnapped and murdered four females, two women and two teenage girls, one from a school bus stop in front of her house. This is not that story, this is a story about that story.
Newspapers called him “THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER” and my editors just couldn’t get enough of it. For several weeks THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER story dominated the front page of my newspaper.
The strangler story was made to order story for afternoon newspapers like The Charlotte News, where I worked as a reporter, because new developments were happening on “our time” — on the p.m. cycle. We were thumping our morning competitor, The Charlotte Observer. The News, which didn’t normally send reporters on out of town assignments, sent our ace 55 miles down I-85 to cover THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER.
I had nothing to do with the strangler story, not until late one morning when I overheard someone on the City Desk say a 17-year-old Charlotte boy had told Charlotte police that he had been threatened by THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER.
I sat near the City Desk and I always had my ears on, listening for stories the city editor or his assistant were about to assign. If I liked the assignment I’d hold my hand up, so to speak, and if I didn’t I’d go to the Men’s Room and hide out until I figured the coast was clear. This time I didn’t do either. I didn’t like that lead –I didn’t believe it — and I didn’t think anyone would have to chase it because it just didn’t make sense.
In the first place the strangler wasn’t killing people in Charlotte, he was killing people in Gaffney, S.C. In the second place, he hadn’t attacked any boys, he attacked women and girls. In the third place, he didn’t call people up on the phone and scare ’em — he snatched them off the street and strangled them.
I didn’t think we’d go after the Charlotte-Boy-Threatened story, but I was wrong. Darrell Sifford, the managing editor, called me and the cop shop reporter over to his desk and told us to find the boy and do a piece for the final edition.
The News prided itself on being a local newspaper. Editors would throw out important national and international news to make room for a so-so story with a local angle. And Charlotte-Boy-Threatened was too good to pass up, even if it did sound goofy.
The other reporter and I didn’t have much time. It was already quarter to 12 and the deadline was 12:30 p.m. Both of us got on the phone and went looking for the boy. Unfortunately, I found him. It was already a few minutes past noon and I had no time to waste.
“Is your name Ralph Harris,*” I asked.
“Yes,” he answered.
“Did you tell the Charlotte police that THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER called you on the telephone and threatened your life?”
“Yes,” he said.
“What, exactly, did THE GAFFNEY STRANGLER say?”
“Ralph Harris, I’m going to kill you,” the boy said.
And then Ralph Harris laughed.
*Ralph Harris was not his real name, but that’s the only thing I made up about this story.
Continued tomorrow.