Second column - January 1998 - Sonny Long
Title - Tragedy of triple homicide; six years old, still unsolved

This never gets any easier. But it must be said.

Six years ago, on Jan. 27, 1992, someone killed three people in Atlanta, Texas. Three members of
the same family. The Butts.

Yes, our Atlanta. Nice, quiet town. Tree-lined streets, churches, playgrounds, schools.

Three dead. Two kids. One, just a baby.

And the killer is still walking around.

Gerri Faye isn't. Jessica isn't. Baby Mackenzie isn't. They are in the ground in a Louisiana
graveyard.

We revisit this crime every year and the questions remain the same.

Who did it? Who else knows? What could have been done differently in the investigation, so we
wouldn't be asking those first two questions?

Why do family and friends torture themselves every year and drag out the pink ribbons and the
candles, and make the walk from the gazebo to Walnut St.

Because they have to.

Because they can't forget.

Because they don't want you to forget.

I don't want to dismiss the death of any child -- they are all tragedies -- but why is the death of the
Ramsey girl in Colorado any more important than the Butts girls in Texas?

Because the family is wealthy? Because she was a beauty queen. We'll never know if Mackenzie
could have been crowned Miss Texas Forest Festival. We'll never know if Jessica made high school
cheerleader or the varsity basketball team. We'll never know if Gerri Faye would have been a
grandmother. Someone snatched those possibilities away on a wet January night or early morning.
Someone put their hands on a little baby and held her head under water until she was dead. Someone
wrapped a phone cord around an 11-year-old's neck and squeezed the life out of her. Someone sat
on top of a woman and strangled her to death with a their bare hands. While her children watched?

Someone is a cold-blooded killer. You know who you are. And someday we will, too.

And what a glorious day that will be. Maybe then we can stop re-living the Butts' tragedy, and talk
about your execution instead.