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thoroughly checked for evidence. There was nothing inside the pickup other than some personal items, which included an umbrella, a jacket, and some papers. A couple of red-brown stains on the headliner and passenger-side doorpost proved to be inconsequential.
    The Nissan Murano, however, yielded much more pertinent evidence, including Darlene’s bags of groceries in the rear cargo area containing a receipt from Wal-Mart in Rome, Georgia, dated 6:22 P.M. on April 6, 2006. There was also a recoil pad for the butt stock of a shotgun lying on the floorboard on the driver’s side of the vehicle. A hair was adhered to the recoil pad, and it was carefully collected along with the pad.
    There were several red-brown stains inside the Murano, and swabs were taken for analysis. They were located on the headliner, the door and steering wheel, and the passenger-side doorpost. Jolly also processed the Murano for latent prints, but none were recovered. Extensive photos were taken of both vehicles.
    While Jolly photographed and collected evidence from the vehicles, the other officers continued to search the scene and found quite a few more items. Approximately ten feet from where Darlene’s body was found, a chewed piece of gum lay on the bank of the pond. The back of a watch was also found lying nearby, and a broken bracelet—silver with pink stones—was found near the gate at the pasture entrance. Several other items, which would later prove to be unrelated to the case, were found at the pond, likely dropped there by some of the many people who had come there regularly to fish. There were also many footprints in the mud at the edge of the pond, but the water content of the soil was so high after the rain that the prints had very little definition, and photographs of the prints show them very blurred and containing standing water.
    Two other items, which investigators believed would prove to be evidence in the case, had been found thrown out on the side of the road near the scene. Two traffic barriers marked Floyd Co with highway signs attached, one reading BE PREPARED TO STOP and the other MEN WORKING , were obviously the property of the road department in Floyd County, Georgia, and had very likely been picked up off the highway and transported over the state line into Alabama by someone other than Floyd County Road Department employees. They were tested for latent prints, but the Department of Forensic Sciences was unable to recover anything from them.
    News of the murder of Darlene Roberts spread quickly, both in Cherokee County and in Rome, Georgia, with the news media reporting in detail about the discovery of her body in the farm pond. Her coworkers at Temple-Inland were shocked to learn that Darlene had been killed only a short time after they had last seen her leaving work for the evening. Ralph Stagner, the Temple-Inland plant manager, told Rome News-Tribune and Cherokee County Herald staff writer Kathy Roe that Darlene had been liked and respected by both management and employees at the plant.
    “She was a true professional,” he said. “We are all deeply saddened by this, and we will miss her. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family.”
    Cherokee County sheriff Larry Wilson gave the press as many details about the slaying as he was able to disclose at that point in the investigation, saying that his officers knew the type of weapon used, but they had not recovered it.
    “We’ll see if we can come up with a motive and a suspect,” he said. “We want to talk to anyone, neighbors, anyone who may have seen something.” Wilson said autopsy results were not expected for several days, and he was concerned that the heavy rain and severe weather, which was expected, might destroy crucial evidence.
    On April 7 and 8, officers fanned out around the community, going house to house to talk with any of the area’s residents who might have information. Several had already come forward to report seeing a black pickup truck