Just another thing that hit me. Another "what if" situation
What if it was a service/tow truck driver that'd committed the murders, and since that was the tow service that the police used to do their impounds; and they just let the guy go? I mean, it's a lot to point fingers in LE's direction (I know that.) But small towns are small towns everybody knows everybody and very well could turn the other cheek for a friend.
Interesting point... with all the accusations against the Ozark PD, maybe they have a grain of truth to them. I hope not, though. :furious:
That grease stain would make it more likely the white truck (if involved) would be a work truck. Now who would've been working that late on a Sat. night? Someone that owned a local business- had a job to complete and worked late.....someone that worked at one and was allowed to use the shop in their personal time, someone on call for a local wrecker service...hmmm...were call logs of local wreckers checkedfor that evening? Someone returning from a call and happened upon the B/L to grab a drink, or gas and there the girls were...that crime of opportunity angle...
You know, that sounds spot on. I was thinking about the fact that the truck could be unrelated to a vehicle business, like it could be a publicity decal for something else like a food company or even just a decoration put up by the owner of the vehicle. But the grease stain gives it a whole different angle as you say. Do you know if it was car grease?
If it was some kind of mechanical grease, it could be someone who worked with cars (mechanic, tow truck, whatever) or... it could be someone who was a vehicle enthusiast and had been working late on their truck. The kind of fan who would costumize their vehicle to have decals, special wheels, etc. Either way, it's got to be someone who was big into cars and trucks so that could narrow it down.
At the same time, I think that also makes it less likely to have been a casual appearance at the B/LS. IMO of course. I think that a local person and one who worked with vehicles at that would know the closing hours of that kind of place and probably went there often themselves to refuel their vehicles. Maybe not - maybe they routinely went elsewhere, the store had changed its hours recently, it wasn't someone local but someone who was passing by and had ill intentions, or maybe the truck isn't even related if it's someone who was driving long-distance and stopped to rest. BUT if it's from a local business and someone who was likely to know the store well... that just makes it so much more suspicious to me.
An interesting point in regard to the speculation on tow companies, the grease stain, et al... One of the 'dead link' reports I found about people being arrested for impersonating a police officer in the Dothan area was in regard to a local mechanic. As the link was dead, I couldn't get any further info. I believe it was a TV news article from the past couple of years however.
I myself eat, sleep and breathe cars, owning a few collector cars myself. I've looked at the surveillance pic about 22 to the 10th power times and come up with a different conclusion each time. We really need to see a few more pics to try to 'fill in the spaces'.
If the site you found it in isn't working anymore, you can go to archive.org and where it says Wayback Machine just paste the URL. Then you can select a date during which it would have been available if there's an archived copy in there.