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Joe Shepherd

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Joe shepard

Joe Shepherd

Real Name: Joseph Arlen Shepherd
Aliases: Joe
Wanted For: Murder
Missing Since: July 1978

Case[]

Details: Joe Shepherd of Tellico Plains, Tennessee is wanted for the murders of sixteen-year-old Roxanne Woodson and fifteen-year-old Cathy Clowers. On the night of February 27, 1978, Roxanne and Joe, then twenty-six, were in his car together with two friends when he tried to make sexual advances on her. She refused and he tried to attack her. She escaped from the car and ran into the woods. He chased after her; she was never seen again.
The night after Roxanne was reported missing, authorities went to Shepherd's home to bring him in for questioning. He asked if he could change into his boots, and the officers let him do so. While in his room, he reached for his shotgun. The officers noticed this and fired two warning shots at him. Eventually, they were able to wrestle the gun away from him; he was then brought in for interrogation. He told authorities that on the night Roxanne vanished, he tried to seduce her, but was unsuccessful. He admitted to chasing her into the woods but claimed that he lost track of her and couldn't find her. He was charged with assaulting a police officer but released on bond.

Hundreds of searchers tried to locate Roxanne but were unsuccessful. After several days, the search was called off. Then, on April 8, 1978, Shepherd's mother noticed her dogs around a certain pile of debris in the backyard. She moved some of it and saw two hands sticking out of the ground. Authorities determined that the body, which had been partially buried in the ground, was Roxanne's. At that point, authorities charged Shepherd with first-degree murder. He was arrested at his mother-in-law's home.
During the second interrogation, Shepherd claimed that as he was chasing Roxanne in the woods, she fell and hit her head on a rock. He told investigators that he panicked and returned to the car with his friends. He said that he returned later that night to drive her body back to his house and bury it in the backyard.
After being charged with Roxanne's murder, Shepherd was implicated in Cathy's March 1976 disappearance. When questioned, he stated that he not only knew her, but also where her body was buried. He took investigators to the location, and they eventually found her clothes and body. Both victims had their underpants wrapped around their heads.
On April 17, 1978, Shepherd was formally indicted with Cathy's murder. On July 17, 1978, while awaiting trial in the county jail, he escaped with two other inmates, after one of them feigned illness and then locked the jailer in their cell. The other two were ultimately caught. Shepherd, however, remained at large.
Extra Notes: This case first aired on the October 5, 1988 episode. It was updated on the December 14, 1988 episode. It was later reprofiled in the Dennis Farina hosted series on the August 11, 2009 and August 17, 2009 episodes.
Some sources spell Joe's surname as "Shepard."

Shepherd 1988

Shepherd after his 1988 arrest

Results: Captured. In November 1988, Shepherd was arrested in London, Ontario, Canada under the alias "Joseph Tripp" after a viewer contacted police. At the time, he was living in a government housing project with his common-law wife and their two children. In December 1989, he was returned to prison in Tennessee. He was convicted of Cathy's second-degree murder, but after an appeal, the charge was lowered to involuntary manslaughter. In spring 1991, he was convicted of Roxanne's first-degree murder and sentenced to death. In 1997, his sentence was commuted to life in prison after he pleaded guilty to Roxanne's first-degree murder and agreed to no longer appeal this case. He died in prison of natural causes in August 2010.
Roxanne's grandmother, Dorcas Woodson, passed away in 2011.
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