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Joe Shepherd

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Joe shepard

Joe Shepherd

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

Case[]

Details: Joe Shepherd is wanted for the murders of sixteen-year-old Roxanne Woodson and fifteen-year-old Cathy Clowers. He is the youngest of eleven children and lived with his parents in Tellico Plains, Tennessee. He is also the father of four children. He quit school after the third grade and sometimes worked as a mechanic. He had previous arrests for breaking & entering and theft. He often spent time with drug dealers. He also went with teenagers to drug and alcohol parties, even though he was much older than them.
Roxanne was a single mother who had recently moved to Tellico Plains from Indiana. On the evening of February 27, 1978, she went with her boyfriend, Frankie Harris, to the home of his cousins, Charles and Wilbur Bovard, in nearby Arden, Tennessee. They were hanging out in the front yard when Joe, then twenty-six, arrived and asked if they wanted to drive around.
The group drove to Tellico Plains, picked up Wilbur's girlfriend, and parked on a nearby bridge. At around 8pm, Wilbur and his girlfriend left. A short time later, the rest of the group headed back to Tellico Plains. However, when they reached Tellico Beach, Joe turned onto Old Furnace Road. After driving for about a mile, he parked next to the Cherokee National Forest.
As Frankie and Charles watched from the backseat, Joe made sexual advances toward Roxanne. When she rebuffed him, he became angry and attacked her. She tried to fight back. At one point, he pulled out a toy gun, pointed it at her, and demanded sex from her. She jumped out of the car and ran into the forest. He chased after her. She never returned.
When Roxanne failed to come home, her family began to worry. Her father, John, talked to Frankie and Charles the next day. He then reported her missing. Initially, the police believed she had run away, possibly to her mother's house in Indiana. However, they suspected foul play when her mother came to Tellico Plains to search for her.
The night after Roxanne was reported missing, two Monroe County, Tennessee deputies, Bill Bevins and Marshall Hendricks, went to Joe's house to question him about her disappearance. He agreed to take them to the place where he last saw her. They waited while he went into his bedroom to put on his boots.
Deputy Bevins overheard Joe cursing and saying to himself, "I'm getting goddamn tired of being aggravated by these sons of bitches about these damn whores." He then came out with a shotgun and pointed it at the deputies. They fired two warning shots. After a brief struggle, they wrestled the gun away from him. He was then brought in for interrogation.
According to Joe, Roxanne had been taking pills that night. She got mad at him when he repeatedly made sexual advances toward her. She jumped from the car and ran into the woods. He ran after her but soon lost sight of her. He returned to the car and told Frankie and Charles that he could not find her. They tried to search for her but were unsuccessful.
Joe was booked for assaulting a police officer and contributing to the delinquency of a minor. He was then released on bond. Meanwhile, over sixty people combed through the Cherokee National Forest for several days, looking for Roxanne. Joe voluntarily joined them. The police brought in search dogs to follow her scent into the woods. They tracked her for a few yards before the trail abruptly stopped. Still, the searchers found no trace of her.
Roxanne's family began to panic. According to her grandmother, Dorcas, Roxanne loved her father, John, and would not have run off. Her family felt "no relief" because they did not know what happened to her. After a few frustrating days, the search was called off.
When Joe failed to appear at a preliminary hearing in March 1978, a search began for him. On March 29, Monroe County investigators visited his ex-mother-in-law's home in Gastonia, North Carolina. She said he was not there. The investigators went in anyway and found him hiding in a bedroom. Joe was rolled up in the covers under the foot of a child's bed.
Two weeks later, on the afternoon of April 8, Joe's mother, Velma, was standing at her kitchen window when she noticed her dogs digging at a junk pile in the backyard. She went to the pile, moved some things around, and discovered two hands sticking out of the ground. She immediately called the police.
The police recovered Roxanne's decomposed body from the shallow grave. Recent rains had partially unearthed it. She was nude from the waist down, some of her clothes were missing, and her pants had been wrapped around her head. Her body was identified via dental records. The Monroe County Sheriff's Office then obtained a warrant charging Joe with first-degree murder.
On April 10, Joe was returned to Tennessee. During a second interrogation, his story began to change. He claimed that when Roxanne ran into the forest, he chased after her. At one point, she fell and struck her head on a rock. Believing she was knocked out, he tried repeatedly to wake her up. When she did not respond, he panicked and returned to his car and friends. He told them she had run off into the woods. They then left.
Joe claimed he returned to the scene later that night. Unsure if Roxanne was dead or alive, he carried her back to his car and placed her in the front passenger seat. He drove to a nearby beach and tried to revive her with water. He then took her to his house and tried to revive her with a cloth covered in rubbing alcohol.
When his attempts to revive her failed, Joe buried Roxanne in his backyard. He claimed he did this because he had had previous encounters with law enforcement and was afraid to contact them. According to Special Agent Wayne Adkins of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, Joe never admitted to being responsible for Roxanne's death.
On April 12, Joe was brought before a judge, who recommended that he be formally charged with Roxanne's murder. His bond was set at $150,000. As Roxanne's story began to draw to a close, another murder case was about to be reopened. According to Detective Sergeant David Guy of the McMinn County Sheriff's Office, Joe had become "buddies" with the investigators who had questioned him. He had learned to trust them, and he wanted to help them.
Monroe County Detective Joseph Graves had received an anonymous phone call linking Joe to the disappearance of fifteen-year-old Cathy Clowers. She had vanished from her home in Englewood, Tennessee, two years earlier, on March 27, 1976. She was described as a loving, outgoing person. She came from an impoverished family and had learning disabilities. According to her special education teacher, she had the mental capabilities of a much younger person.
Investigators learned that Joe and Cathy had first met at a house party. They were seen drinking and smoking marijuana together at several parties. At one party, he allegedly slapped her and then took her into a bedroom. Investigators also discovered that Cathy had been with Joe and a teenage boy, Billy Gentry, on the night she disappeared.
Investigators spoke with Billy, who said he was with Cathy's brother, Jerry, and Joe on the night she disappeared. When Joe dropped Jerry off at home, he saw Cathy and asked if she was old enough to date. Jerry went inside. A short time later, he returned and said Cathy could go with them. She got into the backseat of the car. However, Joe did not let Jerry go with them.
According to Billy, he and Cathy smoked marijuana and drank some beer that Joe bought. Joe drove them to Coker Creek Mountain, near Tellico Plains. He parked near a railroad crossing on State Highway 68. When Billy exited the car, Joe got into the backseat with Cathy. About fifteen minutes later, she got out as well. She was crying and said she wanted to go home.
On the way back, Billy found a prescription bottle of pills. Joe said they could take the pills to get a "good buzz". They declined. Joe bought more beer, which Billy and Cathy drank while Joe drove around. At around 1am, Joe dropped Billy off and left with Cathy.
When Billy learned about Cathy's disappearance, he asked Joe what happened to her. Joe said she had gotten into a car with several teenage boys at Woods Truckstop, near Madisonville, Tennessee. They then headed to Florida.
When questioned, Joe told Detective Graves that he knew Cathy and was with her the night she disappeared. He said he would tell them where he last saw her if they let him talk to his father. After talking to his father, he agreed to tell investigators what happened to her.
Joe claimed that on the night Cathy disappeared, they partied and smoked marijuana with several others. Later that night, he and Cathy parked at the top of Tellico Mountain and fell asleep. When he woke up the next day, she was dead. He dragged her body into the nearby woods and buried her. He told Detective Graves that he could take the investigators to the spot where he buried her.
On April 13, 1978, investigators took Joe to the Cherokee National Forest off State Highway 68 in Polk County, Tennessee. After walking about 100 yards, Joe pointed out a spot under a rhododendron thicket for them to dig. After they had dug down several feet without result, District Attorney General Richard Fisher took over.
Within moments, a piece of red cloth came up with the pickaxe's head. It matched the clothing Cathy was wearing when she disappeared. Soon after, a body was recovered from the shallow grave. Joe was crouched down next to it. According to Attorney General Fisher, Joe looked up with a cold smile and said, "See, I told you so." He felt Joe was proud that he had produced a body for them. Joe showed no other emotion at all.
Though the body was badly decomposed, Dr. William Bass, a noted forensic anthropologist, identified it as Cathy's. She had previously chipped a tooth, and a matching chipped tooth was found on the body. Dr. Bass found no evidence on the body to indicate the cause of death. There were no gunshot wounds, stab wounds, or broken bones.
According to Attorney General Fisher, Cathy's pants were found wrapped around her head. The same thing had been done to Roxanne's body. Cathy's jean jacket, bra, and underwear had also been removed from her body and placed in the grave.
Lab tests found traces of the prescription antidepressant drug Sinequan in Cathy's system. However, it was not a fatal amount. A psychiatrist had prescribed Sinequan to Joe a few months before Cathy's disappearance. The psychiatrist told Joe not to take the drug with alcohol, as it can increase sleepiness.
On April 17, a grand jury formally indicted Joe for Cathy and Roxanne's murders. He was also indicted for kidnapping, rape, attempted forcible rape, and aggravated assault on police officers.
On April 29, Joe changed his story about Cathy's disappearance. He claimed he had left Cathy with two friends, Frankie Harris and Rick Hooper. They later showed him where she was buried. However, Detective Graves found nothing to back up this story. Instead, investigators looked into the possibility that Joe was involved in other disappearances, including that of a girl from Gastonia, North Carolina. She was reportedly last seen with him. They searched the woods near where Cathy was found. However, nothing was discovered.
Because of publicity, Joe's trial was moved to Bradley County, Tennessee, and scheduled for October 1978. He was held at the Bradley County Jail in Cleveland. On July 17, a jailer was summoned to a cell near Joe's. An inmate pretending to be sick lured the jailer into the cell. His cellmate then held a homemade knife to the jailer's throat.
After locking up the jailer in their cell, the two inmates went to Joe's cell and released him. They ran to a nearby taxi stand, pulled a knife on the driver, and forced him to take them to a wooded area about four miles east of Cleveland. They then released him unharmed.
While the other two escapees were recaptured the following week, Joe remains at large. Sergeant Guy is certain that Joe is a psychopathic killer and a danger to society. Based on how Joe committed his crimes, Sergeant Guy believes he has a "criminal" mind that feels no guilt and is capable of anything. Investigators do not know what sets him off.
Roxanne and Cathy's murders continue to haunt the residents of Tellico Plains. Roxanne's grandmother, Dorcas, wants to see Joe brought to justice. She wants justice for Roxanne, but she also wants Joe to be caught so that he cannot hurt anyone else.
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.
  • It was submitted to the show by Tennessee authorities.
  • Phillip Swanson, a classmate of Roxanne's, wrote the book "Joe Shepherd's Dash: A Serial Killer in the Mountains and His Predatory Ways".
  • Sixteen-year-old Trenny Lynn Gibson disappeared from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee on October 8, 1976. Her mother asked investigators to look into the possibility that Joe was involved in her disappearance.
  • Some sources spell Joe's last name as "Sheppard" or "Shepard", his middle name as "Arlin", and Cathy's name as "Kathy", and state that: Joe was thirty in 1978; Cathy was fourteen or sixteen; she disappeared on March 21 or 28; she lived in Liberty Hill; Roxanne disappeared on February 26; Joe parked on Lyons Creek Road; he attacked her twice; their friends left them alone so that he could "calm" her, and when they came back, she was gone; her body was found in his front yard; her denim jacket was wrapped around her head; his girlfriend told police about him being connected to Cathy's disappearance; he was indicted on April 21; and he escaped on July 18.
Shepherd 1988

Joe after his 1988 arrest

Results: Captured - After the broadcast, the police in London, Ontario, Canada, received a call from a viewer who believed that Joe was his neighbor, "Joseph James Tripp". The police began a six-week investigation into "Tripp". They learned he lived in a government housing project in Pond Mills with his common-law wife and two children. He worked odd jobs in London, most recently a part-time position at an auto shop.
The police could find no record of "Tripp" before 1984. They conducted surveillance on him for two weeks. They soon confirmed that he was Joe Shepherd. On November 18, 1988, after ten years on the run, he was arrested as he exited his truck to go into a convenience store. He was positively identified via fingerprints.
According to Tennessee District Attorney General Jerry Estes, Joe was in London within days of his escape. His common-law wife had known him for almost ten years. She and others who knew him in London were shocked to learn about his past.
After his arrest, Joe sought asylum in Canada as a "refugee from persecution". The U.S.-Canadian extradition treaty stipulated that he could not be returned to a state that planned to use the death penalty. Attorney General Estes agreed not to seek the death penalty in Cathy's case because it had been considered unconstitutional at the time of her death.
On December 16, 1989, Joe was deported to the United States. In January 1990, he was returned to Tennessee. Along with the murder charges, he also faced charges of rape, aggravated assault against a police officer, and escape.
In November 1990, Joe went on trial for Cathy's murder. Prosecutors theorized that he killed her in anger after she resisted his sexual advances. They believed he either choked her to death, smothered her, or forced her to overdose. His former girlfriend's sister testified that he had admitted to killing and burying Cathy. He had also once given the sister a "nerve" pill that paralyzed her for three days. Billy Gentry testified that he last saw Cathy with Joe.
Joe's defense attorneys noted that Cathy's cause of death had never been determined. They suggested she may have overdosed on drugs while partying or committed suicide. However, her special education teacher testified that she was not depressed or suicidal. His former girlfriend (and mother of two of his children) testified that he had told her that a group of teenage boys forced Cathy to overdose on drugs and then buried her. On November 28, he was convicted of second-degree murder in Cathy's case and sentenced to ninety-nine years in prison.
In April 1991, Joe went on trial for Roxanne's murder. Prosecutors theorized that, like with Cathy, he killed Roxanne because she rejected his sexual advances. They believe he raped or attempted to rape her while they were in the forest. A pathologist testified that Roxanne most likely died of asphyxiation or suffocation. He found no signs of trauma on her body, and there was no evidence she had struck her head like Joe had claimed.
Frankie Harris and Charles Bovard testified that Joe attacked Roxanne and chased her into the forest. He also told them to keep quiet about what happened. His defense attorneys claimed he did not have enough time to rape and kill her. They also said it would not make sense for him to bury her body in his backyard.
On April 4, Joe was convicted of first-degree felony murder in Roxanne's case. He was also convicted of aggravated assault. At his sentencing hearing, a clinical psychologist testified that Joe had below-average intelligence and emotional problems stemming from an unhappy childhood. The psychologist also said Joe did not have sociopathic or antisocial personality disorders. Prosecutors, meanwhile, told the jury about his conviction in Cathy's case and the rape charges against him. On April 5, he was sentenced to death.
In October 1992, Joe appealed his murder conviction in Cathy's case. The Tennessee State Court reversed it due to pretrial publicity. They believed the jury may have been biased by the Unsolved Mysteries broadcast. Some jurors knew about the other charges against him. A few even thought he was guilty before the trial.
In May 1995, the Tennessee Supreme Court reversed Joe's death sentence. They stated that since his conviction in Cathy's case had been overturned, it could not be used as an "aggravating circumstance" to justify imposing the death sentence in Roxanne's case. His sentence was then reduced to life in prison.
In April 1996, Joe went on trial a second time for Cathy's murder. On April 26, he was convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Because of this, his sentence in Roxanne's case had to be reconsidered by a jury. However, in May 1997, he pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in her case to avoid the death penalty. He was sentenced to life in prison with no more appeals. He also received two five-year sentences: one for involuntary manslaughter and the other for assaulting the jailer during his escape.
In 2000, Joe was interviewed by the Advocate & Democrat. Despite his guilty plea, he maintained his innocence. He claimed that Frankie Harris and another teenage boy, Rick Hooper, had killed Cathy and Roxanne and then framed him.
Joe claimed he was with Cathy, Frankie, and Rick on the night of her death. He kept "fading in and out" because he was on drugs. At one point, he saw her body in the back of his car and heard Frankie and Rick say she was dead. Later, he heard them digging her grave.
Joe claimed that Roxanne ran off with Frankie the night she died. He said he told the police this, but they did not believe him. However, there is no evidence to support his claims. Joe had previously told the police that he had buried Roxanne after she hit her head. He had also said that Charles Bovard, not Rick, was with him, Frankie, and Roxanne that night.
On August 28, 2010, Joe died of natural causes at the Northeast Correctional Complex, where he was serving his life sentence. He was fifty-eight.
On August 14, 2011, Roxanne's grandmother, Dorcas, passed away at age ninety-two.
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