Family Of Murdered Comanche Woman Hoping Reward Can Help Solve Cold Case

After 26 years of silence, the family of a woman murdered in southwest Oklahoma is hoping a reward will produce new leads and the family is raising money to help solve the cold case and finally bring a killer to justice.

Sunday, September 14th 2014, 10:50 pm

By: News 9

Family Of Murdered Comanche Woman Hoping Reward Can Help Solve Cold Case

After decades of silence, the family of a woman murdered in southwest Oklahoma is hoping a reward will produce new leads.

The family is raising money to help solve the cold case and finally bring a killer to justice.

This year marks 26 years since Mary Morgan Pewitt was gruesomely murdered in her home. Her family has tried everything to get information, except for offering a reward.

Becky Pentland says she can vividly remember the day she got the phone call her cousin Mary had been murdered.

"June 4, 1988 was probably one of the worst days in my entire life, I felt like literally someone reached inside of my chest, and grabbed my heart and just squeezed the life out of it," said Pentland, who now lives in Austin, but grew up was grew up with Mary.

At 25 years old, Mary was found covered in blood inside her Comanche home by her 6 and 7-year-old daughters. And the home is next door to an elementary school.

"This was not just a murder, it was a slaughter, she was stabbed over 35 times, the people who did this tried to cut out her breast," Pentland said.

Mary had worked as a nurse and then later as a server at the now torn-down Harold's Club. She was married three times, but none of the husbands were ruled to be suspects, and her last husband was incarcerated at the time of her murder.

Mary's killer was never found, but the case is still open.

"We haven't forgotten about this case, this is near and dear to us as well, I can't imagine being the family in this situation, but we will always continue to work it, as long as we have something to work,” said OSBI spokesperson Jessica Brown.

OSBI says even the coldest of cases can be solved. All OSBI agents have at least 12 to 13 cases open at one point in time, and there are only about 75 agents across the state in the field.

"That's where we can hope we might get a break in this case, if someone knows something and finally they are willing to come forward because they don't have a relationship with the suspect anymore," Brown said.

So Mary's family has taken the investigation in their own hands. They've set up Facebook pages, a Web site and even got June 4 proclaimed "Justice for Mary Morgan Day" in Comanche.

Now, they're raising money for a reward.

"This is fund will be given to the person or persons who give us information, valid information, that will lead to the arrest and conviction of the killer or killers, we believe that there were more than one person involved," Pentland says.

"A lot of the locals have expressed to us that they are afraid to come forward, and we're hoping that this will entice someone to come forward because this person will do this again. It's only a matter of time.”

Donate to Mary's Reward fund here.