Marvin Carlton “Skip” McClendon, Jr., 74, was arrested Tuesday night at his home in Bremen, Alabama, said Essex County Attorney Jonathan Blodgett. He is accused of killing Melissa Ann Tremblay in 1988 and throwing her at a Lawrence Railroad Shipyard in Massachusetts. After she died, a freight car passed over Tremblay’s body, amputating her left leg. “It was brutal and horrible, and άτομο the person [I eventually became] “He has a lot to do with her and losing her in such a brutal way,” Andrea Ganley, a Tremblay’s childhood friend, told The Daily Beast. McClendon, who worked for the Massachusetts Department of Corrections, is now being held in a detention center in Cullman, Alabama, Deputy Chad Whaley confirmed to The Daily Beast. On September 11, 1988, Tremblay drove with her mother and her mother’s friend to the LaSalle Social Club in Lawrence, Massachusetts, about a 20-minute drive from their home in Salem, New Hampshire. Sometime in the afternoon, Tremblay went out to play while the adults were having fun at the club. They never saw her again. After a frantic search in the area, Tremblay’s mother and her boyfriend reported her missing. The little girl’s body was discovered the next day. Investigators are investigating “decades of witnesses, suspects and interested persons” over the coming weeks, months and years, Blodgett said. Then, the case cooled down. In 2014, a team of assistant prosecutors and state police detectives specializing in unsolved crimes redoubled their efforts in the Tremblay case, according to the Essex County DA Office. Investigators learned that McClendon was living in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, about 16 miles from Lawrence at the time of Tremblay’s assassination. He was a carpenter and “worked and frequented facilities in Lawrence, including the Seventh-day Adventist Church on Salem Street,” the DA office said in a press release. The evidence recovered from Tremblay’s body was “organic in resolving the case,” he said. McClendon “was a person of interest for a period of time,” Blogget told reporters. In an email, the spokeswoman for Essex County Prosecutor Carrie Kimball told the Daily Beast that she was unable to comment further on the details of the evidence that provided the break in the case, but that more details would be given in court. Trebley, a sixth-grader at Lancaster School in Salem, New Hampshire, was “11 years old” at the time of her death. of. murder, he said in a telephone interview Wednesday. Ganley, who was four years younger than Tremblay, told the Daily Beast she had experienced “a train of emotions” since learning of McClendon’s arrest. “At first I was very shocked,” Ganley said. “I am still in shock. This day is really here, and it really happens. We always hoped this day would happen… There are times when you lose hope, but I want other families and other friends who are victims of what is now called a “cold affair” – never give up hope. The notorious serial killer Tommy Lynn Sells, who confessed to 13 murders in seven states and was executed by lethal injection in 2014, was once considered a possible suspect. But the carnival worker driving the train was later cleared and detectives continued to hope for a steady lead. Ganley said she had never heard of McClendon before announcing his arrest and that investigators had never identified him before. “While it’s a train of emotions, sadness, grief and happiness that one would be held responsible for, it is shocking that he was a prison officer going to church,” Ganley said. “The fact that he was a member of law enforcement never went through any of us.” Over the years, Ganley said she always wondered who could have killed her friend so hard. “People do not just kill a child when you are a predator,” he said. “He was not an uncle or a parent or anything like that, so what kind of person would do that? How did he cross his path? Was he watching her? Did she fall that day? Are there any other families out there waiting for the closure? “There are a lot of questions that need to be answered.” McClendon’s arrest obviously does not bring Treble back, Ganley admitted. However, he explained, seeing him in handcuffs opens the door for what he defined as the second stage of the mourning process “. Tremblay “touched many lives,” Ganley said, adding, “Everyone at school knew Missy.” “Her mom died several years ago, her father was very uninvolved [and] “I do not know if he is still alive or not,” Ganley said. “I know there is a cousin… I share their grief. I’m glad they have a closure, I’m glad for everyone [of Tremblay’s] the friends. “People of all ages, her friends, all the school staff, the Salem Boys and Girls Club – everyone’s lives were affected by it.” As for McClendon, Ganley is anxiously awaiting more details along with everyone else. “What did that do to him?” asked. “If he is a parent, that is something I would like to know. “If she has children, I feel terrible for them.” Detective Thomas Murphy was the chief investigator in the case in 1988. After retiring, his son joined the force and monitored the progress of the investigation. In a press conference Wednesday, Blodgett thanked the Essex State Police Detective Unit, the Massachusetts Department of Corrections, the FBI, Tewksbury, Sheriff’s Office and Polley County Sheriff Eull Their “tireless” work. He also made a special note that he called Murphy for his help, having seen the case from day one. “I want to thank everyone who participated in this research from start to finish,” said Blodgett. “Their tireless pursuit of justice for Melissa has brought us to this moment. “We never forgot Melissa, nor did we relinquish responsibility for her killer.” McClendon is scheduled to be arraigned in an Alabama courtroom on Thursday.
