The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky on September 17, 1989 · Page 6
OCR. It was pretty jumbled. And out of order.
Harry Maupin vanished four years ago, and his relatives and a police investigator are convinced that the Harlan County coal operator was killed. "I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt I am working on a murder case," Kentucky State Police Detective Denny Pace said. Maupin's sister, Louise Brackett, agrees. "I think he was murdered, either for money or for a debt"
Maupin disappeared on June 18, 1985, from his office at the Gano Coal Co. mine, of which he was a part owner. There were rumors at the time that Maupin, then 40, had absconded with a large amount of cash from an alleged business deal or that he had run off with a woman. Brackett, of Milton, W.Va., said she knows better because her brother was close to his family. "You Just had to know him. "It's ridiculous the state of Tennessee never even opened an active murder Investigation," Brackett said. "The crux of a concealed- or re-ceiving-stolen-property charge is being able to prove that the property is in fact stolen," said Sonny Sexton, a Tennessee assistant attorney general "Without the testimony of the coal operator that the gun was in fact stolen, one of the primary elements was missing." Pace said evidence concerning Maupin's disappearance was presented to the Harlan County grand jury in July 1986, but no indictments resulted. Acting on some information Pace obtained in Tennessee, divers searched Norris Lake, in Tennessee, for Maupin's body, but found nothing. Pace said he still has suspects, whom he would not identify, and that he remains optimistic about eventually winning an indictment Margaret Maupin, Harry's older daughter, said the mystery has been a "nightmare" for her and her younger sister, Elizabeth, who was 7 at the time of the disappearance. "It's hard any time you lose somebody you love," said Margaret Maupin, now 25. "But in a situation like this, when you don't know what happened, it's that much harder. "My little sister, Elizabeth, still has nightmares to this day. She says all the time it's as if her father dropped off the face of the earth, and in a way that's true. But on the other hand, that's not the case at all. Somebody out there knows exactly what happened to our father." pess, like we did," Brackett said. "When he hadn't been heard from in this length of time, we knew something was wrong. There are those people who, if you don't hear from them in six months, you don't worry. And then there are those people like Harry." Pace said the Maupin case has been more consuming than any other in his 9 years as a detective. "It has its frustrating moments, but I'm not going to give up until I get a murder indictment," he said. Pace must refer to his investigation as "a supposed murder case" because Maupin's body has not been found. But "I recovered the gun I believe was used to kill him, and I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt I am working on a murder case, not a missing-person investigation," Pace said. The trail has led Pace throughout Kentucky and Into Tennessee. He thinks Maupin was slain with his own handgun a blue steel Smith & Wesson ,44-callber Magnum found in Lafollette, Tenn., after it apparently changed hands a few times. Charges of concealing stolen property (the gun) were filed against four members of a Union County, Tenn., family in 1986. But one of the four the most likely culprit, according to Tennessee authorities died, and a case against the others wouldn't hold up. Charges were dropped in 1987. Brackett and other relatives get riled when discussing the Tennessee investigation. They call it "the lack of any investigation."