Handgun not weapon in Staunton double murder

Staunton police have determined that a handgun once in the possession of the lead detective in the 1967 High's Ice Cream double murder was not the weapon used to kill the two clerks.

The .25-caliber handgun, turned in to the Staunton Police Department on Jan. 23 by a Staunton resident, tested negative, Staunton authorities said yesterday.

The ballistics didn't match, and the handgun was manufactured after 1972, said Lisa Klein, a spokeswoman for the Staunton Police Department.

The gun -- the same caliber as that used to kill two female clerks -- was given to police by Kathy Myers, the circulation manager for The News Leader, Staunton's daily newspaper. She said her late husband, who was also a Staunton police detective, was given the gun by Staunton police Detective Davie Bocock in 1981.

Myers, whose memory was jogged by a News Leader webcast on the crimes, was curious whether there was a connection between the gun and the crime.

Bocock, the lead investigator in the murders, was implicated in the killings in a deathbed confession by Sharron Diane Crawford Smith. Smith died Jan. 19. Bocock died several years ago.

Smith, whose involvement in the crime was uncovered by private citizens and private investigators as well as police, told investigators in a series of interviews late last year that she killed the two clerks. Smith claimed that Bocock helped her bury a .25-caliber handgun used in the murders and knew she had committed the murders.

The crime went unsolved for more than 40 years until Smith was arrested in December in the murders of 19-year-old Constance Hevener and her sister-in-law, 20-year-old Carolyn Perry. The two women were shot at point-blank range as they were preparing to close the ice-cream store in a small shopping center in Staunton's north end.

Smith said the handgun was buried on property that Bocock once owned. Authorities used metal-detecting equipment to search that property, located just outside of Staunton, but were unsuccessful.

Staunton police said they will continue to look for the murder weapon.

"If we get any leads we're following up on it," Klein said.

Contact Carlos Santos at (434) 295-9542 or .