Seven days after the brutal murder of Sharon Beatrice Jones in her dorm room during spring break, Elizabeth City State University Chancellor Dr Jimmy R. Jenkins addressed a specially gathered student and faculty assembly in the Vaughan Center on campus.
Jenkins was a distinguished looking man and a graduate of the university with a Bachelor’s degree in Biology. He would go on to have a highly successful career in university administration with future stops as Chancellor at Edward Waters College (FL) & Livingstone College (NC). At this time, Jenkins was the first alumnus of ECSU to serve as its Chief Executive Officer. However, on Monday 12th March 1984, the Chancellor was sombre and immediately looked to calm the nerves of the student body and reassure parents. He laid out his plans to put the university into a security clamp-down by taking “extraordinary steps” till at least the end of the current spring semester.
Jenkins outlined the new safety initiatives coming into immediate effect would include 24-hour supervision within all dormitories, elimination of the co-ed visitation policy, new peep holes to be installed at any dorm room occupied by a female and the installation of more sophisticated security alarm systems on doors leading into dormitories. Any student involved in breaching the co-ed visitation policy would be suspend immediately by the administration. Further, any non-students found on the university grounds were to be arrested on the spot by campus police. “We do not know who did this very, very tragic deed, and we must be on the lookout for anything that looks out of the ordinary. We all must be security officers”, Jenkins urged.
In an odd twist to the direction of his security update to the gathered students, Jenkins broke off into a broader diatribe about recent anti-social behaviour and campus violence at the state university. “In recent weeks we have been confronted with various acts of barbarism – gang fights”, Jenkins told the gathering. “This type of behaviour will not be tolerated as it has in the past. I’m prepared that if we need to reduce the size of the enrolment of the university (by expelling students) then I’ll do that”. Jenkins then emphatically stated that some current students at ECSU were “not ready to attend a university”.
To close the assembly Jenkins affirmed his desire for the university to create a reward fund, starting at $50,000, for information leading to the arrest of the perpetrator of the recent tragedy. He further specified that if the reward was not collected then the money would be directed to funding a memorial scholarship in honour of Sharon Jones. Whilst the debate about the necessity of the new security measures would persist on-campus over the coming days, investigations into the Jones murder by the Elizabeth City Police Department and the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation continued – as a killer remained at large within the small coastal community.
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On the evening of Sunday 4th March 1984, Sharon Jones, 21, returned to the campus of ECSU, after spending a weekend at her family home in Moyock, N.C. – approximately 24 miles to the north-east of Elizabeth City. It was the start of spring break at ECSU and school would not officially recommence for another week. The vast majority of the student population of 1500 were nowhere to be seen and the campus was eerily deserted. Jones was back on campus early to continue her student-physical education teacher requirements at H.L.Trigg and P.W.Moore Junior High Schools – as she was due to graduate in May as an Education major. Jones had already been offered a teaching position at Moyock Elementary School upon graduation.
After arriving back on campus on this fateful night at approximately 9.30pm, Jones spoke briefly with Assistant Housing Director Herbert Williams and his cousin Adrian Douglas to gain entry into Mitchell Lewis Dormitory, located on the south-eastern side of the campus. Mitchell-Lewis Dormitory was a unremarkable looking three-storey residence hall constructed in 1969 to house female students.
Williams would later tell police that Jones had on returning to campus expressed some level of concern about a light that was showing from a dorm room on the upper level of the residence hall. Williams and Douglas would escort Jones on their entry to the dormitory and investigate the exact source of the light on the second floor. According to Williams, the light in question came from the room of another young woman staying within Mitchell Lewis Dormitory – Angela Denice Jones, aged 22, (no relation to Sharon Jones) from Oak City, N.C. She too was an undergrad at the college and had remained on campus over the holiday period to fulfil her duties as intern security officer. Later it was offered up to authorities by Dr Harry Ghee, Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs, that both Sharon Jones & Angela Jones were to have been relocated to a newer dormitory complex on Monday where a number of other students were already being accommodated. Unfortunately, this would never eventuate as a tragedy was about to unfold.
The following morning, Monday 5th March at 8.35am, the nude body of Sharon Jones was found by a dormitory supervisor face down on the tiled floor of Room 125 with a white cloth belt ligated around her neck and connected to a bedpost. The supervisor had gone to investigate after being concerned by the sighting of a broken window from outside the dormitory. Police speculated that around midnight an unidentified assailant or assailants entered Room 125 (located on the first floor) of the dormitory and viciously attacked Sharon Jones.
The autopsy report from the Pasquotank County Medical Examiner Dr Joe Robertson would state that Jones had died from strangulation. Other injuries sustained in the attack included a blunt force trauma over her right eye and bruises behind her left ear. Dr Robertson reported that evidence of sexual assault was inconclusive. Evidence of some sort of struggle was indicated within the dorm room, with a window being broken from the inside and a small amount of blood found on the window frame. Broken glass was found on the ground outside the window, directly underneath the first-floor room. A blood-stained dumbbell was recovered from the murder scene by detectives, found under one of the beds within the room.
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In hindsight the investigation into the murder of Sharon Jones looked to be floundering almost immediately. Within the first 36 hours of the discovery of Jones body, Elizabeth City Chief of Police W.C. Owens had declared that the preliminary findings had indicated (to him) that “neither robbery nor rape was a motive for the killing, (so) that leaves malice or jealousy”.
With this rush to judgement on motive, local police & the SBI’s investigation immediately locked onto Angela Jones as a potential suspect in the murder – as she was residing on the second floor of Mitchell Lewis Dormitory on the night in question.
So too an individual identified as Delantry Terrial “Tee” Trafton, aged 31 from Elizabeth City, the then boyfriend of Angela Jones. Also an education student at the university, Trafton was said to have been a US Army Special Forces soldier who had served in the Vietnam War. In the two weeks prior to the Jones killing, Trafton had come to the attention of campus security concerning inappropriate behaviour and harassment toward female students within Mitchell Lewis Dormitory. He was rumoured as being placed on a 14-week suspension by school officials, which barred him from further co-ed dormitory visitations. According to statements Trafton provided to police, he spent the night inside the dorm room of Angela Jones and then departed the dormitory at 7.00am the following morning.
Trafton & Angela Jones did provide detectives with some interesting information from the night in question. The pair claimed claim they received a knock on her dorm room door between 11.00pm and 11.30pm. The person, thought to on the outside of the door was alleged to have asked: “Can I know your name?” “What’s your name?” Both Trafton & Angela Jones say they did not reply to these questions through the door and the person moved on.
At midnight, Angela Jones left the room to commence her rostered shift as an on-campus trainee security guard. Near 40 people would be interviewed by the Elizabeth City Police Department and a half dozen persons of interest submitted to lie detector tests administered by the SBI. Bureau agents conducted tests on blood and hair samples as well as latent fingerprints found at the murder scene – but none of the test results proved to be conclusive in incriminating any suspect.
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The life of Sharon Jones was celebrated at the Samuel Chapel Holiness Church in Moyock late on the afternoon of Wednesday 7th March 1984. A crowd of mourners including ECSU Chancellor Dr. Jimmie R. Jenkins packed the chapel to pay respects to their fallen sister. Dr Jenkins, who appeared visibly upset, spoke to the gathering about the unbearable loss. In a subdued voice, he appeared to wonder out aloud, “sometimes it does appear that the good die young.” He added that the university “family” (of ECSU) had been deeply affected by the tragic circumstances.
Sharon was also remembered by Reverend Little Joe Powell as a woman of real faith. He gave passionate dedication to preciousness of life within his moving eulogy. “This was one of the hardest blows I have ever had to take,” Rev Powell mourned. “It was a sad day when I heard the news. I felt like hollerin’”. The Reverend would further lament the passing of Sharon but was firm in his Christian belief that her sufferings were now over.
The Daily Advance would report that only six weeks earlier Sharon had addressed the same congregation from the pews at Samuel Chapel. One church-goer recalled that an assured Sharon told those in attendance that when she died she wanted to go to heaven. Understanding the spiritual significance of her statement , she asked that “if there was any sin in her heart, would God forgive her…?”
Sharon’s family and friends including her mother Mrs Willie B. Jones, a local florist, were in attendance at the funeral. Sharon was the daughter of the late Joshua T Jones Sr, who had been killed in the Vietnam War. Sharon had four siblings – two sisters Sandra and Lisa, as well as two brothers Nicholas and Joshua Jr.
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According to the Robert “RJ” Walker, the Editor of the student newspaper “The Compass” for the 1983 – 1984 school year, ECSU was completely unprepared for this sort of tragedy to occur at the small university. Walker had shared some classes with Sharon Jones and was due to be part of the same graduating class at the end of the spring semester. “Coming back onto campus after spring break to find out Sharon had been killed was devastating”. Walker remembers. “She was the last person you would think would become the victim of this sort of crime. Sharon was quiet and studious. Just the nicest person”.
The effect on the student body was one of paranoia and finger-pointing as his fellow-students tried to determine who had taken the life of the young woman in the most brutal manner. Walker recalls in his role as the Editor of “The Compass” that university officials were keen to control the narrative about the murder and the subsequent investigation by local authorities. He adds, “The ECSU leadership were under immense pressure to manage the fall-out from this tragic event. On top of this there were ongoing safety concerns that killer could strike again”.
By then end of March 1984 Police Chief Owens sounded almost pragmatic about the ability of local law enforcement to charge a suspect with murder of Sharon Jones. “We will actively pursue any leads and witnesses will be re-interviewed”, Owens said. He further pledged, “This doesn’t mean we are out of the ball game. There’s no way we are going to give up on this”.
And then, the investigation went cold.
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Located on Page 10 of the 1983 – 1984 ECSU Yearbook “The Viking”, is an almost cryptic memoriam to the students of the university who “fought a battle and conquered their oppressor”. It comes from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem, “Crossing The Bar: “Their reward, eternal life was granted to them by the master of all forms of life”. The verse closes optimistically: “Because of this, we are assured our fellow Vikings – who have sailed the seas of life with their banners waving high – are without misery and strife. Peaceful eternal security is theirs.” Strangely enough there is no specific dedication or obituary to the recent passing of Sharon Jones within this yearbook, which celebrates the past school year.
Truth be told “security” or more specifically the lack of on-campus security afforded the students of ECSU, appears to have been an on-going issue at the university. In the past decade ECSU has once again been in the public spotlight after the Elizabeth City Police Department became aware that 126 campus crimes dating from 2006 till 2013, including 17 known reports of sexual assault, had not been investigated by campus police.
In early 2013 the State Bureau of Investigation were reported to be examining the university’s reporting of crime on the campus including the institutional response to the reports of sexual assault. The SBI’s probe also investigated alleged witness intimidation and obstruction of justice, after student Katherine Lowe bought to school officials a claim that she had been sexually assaulted by a dorm security officer in Butler Hall. Specifically, Ms Lowe later testified within the Pasquotank County Court that not only did campus police fail to investigate her complaint as a matter of due course, college administrators from the Human Resources Department pressured her to drop the complaint.
What followed in June 203 was even more telling. Anthony Butler Jr, a temporary residence security officer and volunteer women’s basketball coach at the university, was convicted by the county court of two counts of sexual battery, two counts of breaking and entering, and one count of sexual assault – all related to Lowe case. The scandal over the lack of accountability toward campus safety and crimes reporting would ultimately lead to the resignation of Campus Police Chief Sam Beamon and retirement of Chancellor Willie Gilchrist.
In October 2013, ECSU was assessed by the campus and public safety consulting firm Margolis Healy to be “substantially out of compliance” with the Clery Act – being a federal statute that requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal aid programs to keep and disclose information about crime on or near their respective campuses. The consultant’s report would determine that ECSU officials did not understand Clery Act requirements and lacked the systems, processes and trained staff to ensure compliance with the statute.
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How over the course of a relatively short period of time did the Sharon Jones murder investigation become a cold case? Excuses are many and continue to this day. So what are the broader sociological factors that enable some homicides to remain unsolved and quickly forgotten in contrast to those murders that capture the attention of the media and general populace? Lack of police and investigative resources? Poor coordination between law enforcement bodies? Underlying racism within our public institutions? Or just plain indifference. Where then lies the will to serve justice on the perpetrator and more importantly provide solace to the family of those that have been harmed? What allows the wider citizenry to be powerless to act in the face of great injustice to one of their own …
Most perplexing in the Sharon Jones case is the almost complete lack of digital footprint regarding the events around the 1984 period and the subsequent investigation by authorities. Even more troubling is the unsolved murder is not listed as a “cold case” on the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation website. This is a crime that took place at Elizabeth City State University – being a member institution (one of 16 public institutions) of the University of North Carolina system. One wonders the type of media attention a tragedy of this sort would garner at a higher-profile state or prestigious private university, as opposed to a historically black college, located in an economically disadvantaged region.
As an example of possible media bias and disproportion, research the tragic case of UNC sophomore Faith Hedgepeth. The 19-year old from Hollister, N.C., and member of the Haliwa-Saponi tribal community was beaten to death by an unknown intruder within her apartment complex located close to the Chapel Hill campus in September 2012. There was evidence Hedgepeth had been sexually assaulted and detectives confirmed semen had been recovered from the victim. Investigators would also state that an empty Barcardi Peach Rum bottle was used as the murder weapon. This unsolved murder received national and international media attention for close to a decade as police, true crime podcasters and internet sleuths actively investigated leads in the case.
Then in September 2021 the Chapel Hill Police Department arrested Durham resident Miguel Enrique Salguero-Olivares, 28, for Hedgepeth’s murder. The suspect, originally from Guatemala, is believed to have not been known to the victim. Salguero-Olivares is currently being held in Durham County Detention Center awaiting trial. North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein would outline at the arrest press conference that more than 200 DNA samples were analysed to rule out potential suspects in the investigation. A DNA sample from the crime scene is believed to be matched to Salguero-Olivares.
As the 40 year anniversary of the Jones murder approaches, the search for answers in this case should be focused on
advances in DNA technology and genetic genealogy. These developing technologies have led to numerous arrests in cold cases across the US. Most notably the April 2018 arrest and subsequent conviction of Joseph James DeAngelo in Sacramento, California, in the Golden State Killer and East Area Rapist crimes. DeAngelo was responsible for a prolific series of home invasions, rapes and murders which terrorised Californian communities during the 1970’s and 1980’s.
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“They didn’t have to do this to her”. Lisa Jones reflects on the killing of her older sister Sharon and the devastation the murder had on their family unit. When you speak with Lisa Jones you can discern immediately that you are conversing with a thoughtful and sincere person. Her voice is measured but matter of fact as she describes Sharon. “We were like twins”, says Lisa Jones. “She was my best friend”.
To add to the immediate trauma over the loss of her sister in March 1984, Lisa Jones endured the most devastating phone call at her home in Moyock on the day of the funeral of Sharon Jones. While at ECSU, Sharon by coincidence, became good friends with another student named “Sharon Jones” who attended the university. According to Lisa Jones she answered the home phone to hear what sounded like a young man say apologetically, “I’m sorry – I killed the wrong Sharon Jones”. Completely overtaken by emotion Lisa screamed to her mother across the house “Mama, someone’s on the phone saying they killed the wrong Sharon Jones”.
Devasted and unable to psychologically process the shocking phone call, Lisa Jones kept this information to herself for over 20 years. By chance while in downtown Elizabeth City one day in 2005 she decided to visit the Elizabeth City Police Department and discuss the events of the day of the funeral, more specifically the phone call. The response she received from police was staggering. Lisa Jones says the police berated her for coming to them after many years with this new information. “I cried like she (Sharon) was killed her all over again”.
In late 2013, Elizabeth City Police Department issued a public announcement that the Sharon Jones cold case would be re-examined and reinvestigated. It was stated by the department representatives that new improvements in DNA testing maybe be useful in closing this case. The Jones family was not contacted by the ECPD about the re-opening of the case. From what can be surmised, nothing came of the renewed investigation. No further comment on the matter was provided by the ECPD. Just silence.
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If you have any information regarding the unsolved murder of Sharon Beatrice Jones at Elizabeth City State University, please contact Elizabeth City Police Department on Ph. 252-335-4321 .
Sources:
“Police find woman dead in dorm room” (Currie, J.) – The Daily Advance; 5 Mar 1984
“Authorities continuing death probe” (Currie, J.) – The Daily Advance; 6 Mar 1984
“Slaying of student puzzles investigators (Frank, J.) – The Virginian Pilot; 6 Mar 1984
“Authorities questioning suspects in ECSU murder” (Currie, J.) – The Daily Advance; 7 Mar 1984
“Slain student is mourned” (Currie, J.) – The Daily Advance; 8 Mar 1984
“Security is increased after killing” (Frank, J.) – The Virginian Pilot; 13 Mar 1984
“ECSU puts down security clamp” (Lucas, R.) – The Daily Advance; 13 Mar 1984
“Jenkins Addresses University Family” (Mabry, A.H.) – The Compass Newspaper, Elizabeth City State University; March 1984
“Leads few in ECSU murder case” (Haskins, J.) – The Daily Advance; 30 July 1984
“ESCU death probe goes on – questions are numerous” (Lucas, R. & Currie, J.) – The Daily Advance; 29 Mar 1984
“The Viking” (Student Yearbook) 1983-1984 edition – Elizabeth City State University; P. 10
“Suspects prints don’t tie in with older case” (Crofford, C.) – The Daily Advance; 22 June 1986
“ECSU Chancellor Wille Gilchrist Resigns Amid State Investigation Into Campus Crime Reporting” (Kingkade, T.) – https://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2013/05/21/ecsu-chancellor-willie-gilchrist_n_3308484.html (online); 25 May 2013
ECSU dorm security officer guilty of sexual assault (Hampton, J.) –https://pilotonline.com/news/local/crime/ecsu-dorm-security-officer-guilty-of-sexual-assault/article_ead5bf43-3afc-5844-a48a-4a670b5ee4f0.html (online); 11 June 2013
“Study: ECSU Was Substantially Out of Compliance With Clery Act” (CS Staff) – https://www.campussafetymagazine.com/news/study-ecsu-was-substantially-out-of-compliance-with-clery-act/ (online) 16 Oct 2013
“1984 ECSU student murder among cold cases to be re-examined” (Jasek, M.) – https://wtkr.com/2013/12/09/1984-ecsu-student-murder-among-cold-cases-to-be-re-examined/ (online); 9 Dec 2013
“Sister of strangled ECSU student pleads for answers” (Jasek, M.) – https://wtkr.com/2014/02/14/sister-of-strangled-ecsu-student-pleads-for-answers-30-years-later/ (online); 14 Feb 2014
“The murder of Faith Hedgepeth” (Odd Murders & Mysteries) – https://www.oddmurdersandmysteries.com/the-murder-of-faith-hedgepeth/ ( online); 25 January 2022
“1 Year After Arrest In Hedgepeth Murder Case, What Do We Know” ( McConnell, B.) – https://chapelboro.com/news/crime/1-year-after-arrest-in-hedgepeth-murder-case-what-do-we-know ( online); 16 September 2022
“9 years after UNC student was killed, Chapel Hill police make an arrest” (Grubb, T., Shen-Berro, J., Bajpai, A., & Bridges, V.) – https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/crime/article254291273.html (online); 20 January 2022