FILE 456 / 6 January 2024 / 69 MIN / express

Horrors In The Graveyard

Pawtucket, Rhode IslandListen

The town

N ↑Public placePublic placeTown centre (approximate places)
Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

we are going to rhode island today our smallest state and um we're going to pawtucket rhode island about 0:03:26

History, in brief

Town note

The name Pawtucket is an Algonquian word for riverfall.

about 0:05:31

Town note

The first settler was Joseph Jenkins Jr, who came from Lynn, Massachusetts, bought land in the 1600s and built a sawmill and a forge.

about 0:05:37

Town note

The town was destroyed during King Philip's War.

about 0:05:50

Town note

Later settlers planted crops, built ships and by the 1920s Pawtucket was a mill town with factories, half a dozen movie theatres and two dozen hotels.

about 0:06:20
All 5 history facts

Town note

The name Pawtucket is an Algonquian word for riverfall.

about 0:05:31

Town note

The first settler was Joseph Jenkins Jr, who came from Lynn, Massachusetts, bought land in the 1600s and built a sawmill and a forge.

about 0:05:37

Town note

The town was destroyed during King Philip's War.

about 0:05:50

Town note

Later settlers planted crops, built ships and by the 1920s Pawtucket was a mill town with factories, half a dozen movie theatres and two dozen hotels.

about 0:06:20

Town note

Pawtucket built an ornate movie palace called the Million Dollar Theater.

about 0:06:39

The figures, as told

Money

Median home value$322,600
Median household income$56,427
All figures and comparisons, as told in 2024

Population

"75,200"

Comparison: "much less when the murder happened". No direction stated.

As told in 2024 about 0:04:22

Median household income

"$56,427"

Comparison: "below the national average by more than $10,000". Direction: above.

As told in 2024 about 0:04:28

Median home price

"$322,600"

No direction stated.

As told in 2024 about 0:04:35

The reviews

3.0 / 5 · average of 3

5 stars

“the homeliest atmosphere in the world, retro music players at each booth and the most delicious chicken parmesan in the world”
about 0:06:50

3 stars

“gives you this code of everything, hard to explain, one of those places where you have to be in the moment”
about 0:07:43

1 star

“the crime rate has increased tremendously in the past year, the police do their job but people keep committing crimes, everything is unsafe and people are uncomfortable going out at night”
about 0:09:26

“dragon boat races, a dumpling eating contest, a yo-yo performance and lion dancers, with thousands attending every year”
about 0:10:16

In Rhode Island

Closest episodes

  1. Stopping A Serial KillerEast Providence, Rhode Island · 6 July 20248 km / 5 miShow on map
  2. The Tuxedo KillerCranston, Rhode Island · 6 August 202615 km / 9 miShow on map
  3. Smart People, Stupid MurderBarrington, Rhode Island · 6 August 202216 km / 10 miShow on map
  4. The Baby Faced Serial KillerWoonsocket, Rhode Island · 27 May 202118 km / 11 miShow on map
  5. Death Party Crime SpreeNorth Smithfield, Rhode Island · 14 February 202618 km / 11 miShow on map

The story

Sherry Roy was 29 in the summer of 1993, living in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, with two daughters aged about six and eight. She was a heavy drug user whom police called a known prostitute.

Born six weeks premature at three pounds six ounces, he had brain damage in the left frontal region, migraines from the age of four, a stutter and no concentration.

At about ten that evening Roy left the house she shared with her roommate Harold Strobel to buy cigarettes and walked towards Mineral Spring Cemetery, a small city-owned graveyard known as a haunt of drug addicts and prostitutes. She entered the cemetery with them for drugs in exchange for sex, but the boys had agreed to take the sex and give her nothing.

Around half past midnight a neighbour saw two teenage males run from the cemetery covered in blood.

At eight the next morning, 24 August, a woman walking her dogs found Roy's partly clothed body. Her face was so badly beaten that local officers who knew her could not recognise her. The medical examiner found abrasions across the left side of her face and both shoulders, a crescent-shaped defect near her left ear and a skull fractured from the top through the nasal bone; her brain and brain stem had been reduced to small bits. She was alive when the tombstone struck her.

Detectives worked 65 straight hours and lifted fingerprints from the tombstone and a broken tree limb. He admitted being in the cemetery with another male and hitting the girl.

The prosecutor replied that a man who remembered everything and knew the injured woman would have to be killed had not had his will completely paralysed. Roy's sister told the court, 'When you flirt with the devil you dance in hell'.

His lawyers attacked the fingerprints and said he had only watched; the attorney general replied that the beating had covered 103 feet and neither man had stopped the other.

On 7 January 2011 he lost control of his car on I-95 westbound near the Mill Street overpass. Troopers found the car on its roof and a young woman outside it bleeding from the ears, mouth and head.

The case

Murder of Sherry Roy

Victims

Sherry Roy (29). mother of two daughters aged about six and eight; drug addict described by police as a known local prostitute

Accused and outcomes

As told in the episode, on 6 January 2024.

Accused

Accused

Outcome

Other people

Agnes Beck. Sherry Roy's 75-year-old grandmother, punched in the eye by Roy in 1982
Harold Strobel. Roy's roommate, last saw her leaving for cigarettes
Junior Green. friend, drank malt liquor with him that day
Paula Gall. Junior Green's girlfriend, saw and covered in blood after midnight
Giselle Devalimento. girlfriend, washed the blood from the pair's sneakers and testified for the prosecution
Natalie. sister, lived with Giselle
Alfred. Sherry Roy's father
Sherry Roy's two daughters. aged about six and eight when their mother was killed

The timeline

  1. 1982 Sherry Roy, 18, punches her 75-year-old grandmother Agnes Beck in the eye during a quarrel at 10.40 at nightabout 0:17:43
  2. is born six weeks premature, weighing three pounds six ounces, with several bumps on his head damaging the left frontal region of his brainabout 0:13:20
  3. by age four begins suffering severe migraine headachesabout 0:14:59
  4. by 17 has a pronounced stutter and cannot recite the pledge of allegianceabout 0:15:57
  5. August 23, 1993 drinks about three 40-ounce malt liquors and smokes marijuana with Junior Green during the dayabout 0:22:32
  6. August 23, 1993, about 10 p.m. Roy leaves the house she shares with Harold Strobel to buy cigarettes and heads toward the cemeteryabout 0:23:26
  7. August 23, 1993, about 10 p.m. and offer Roy crack cocaine and she enters the cemetery with them (Mineral Spring Cemetery)about 0:23:48
  8. August 23, 1993 has sex with Roy after the pair agree to take the sex and give her no drugs (Mineral Spring Cemetery)about 0:40:05
  9. August 23, 1993 suggests killing Roy so she cannot tell the neighbourhood they stiffed her, and the beating begins (Mineral Spring Cemetery)about 0:40:15
  10. August 23, 1993 Roy is punched, kicked and beaten with sticks and a large branch as she tries to crawl away (Mineral Spring Cemetery)about 0:41:11

Places and phrases

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Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

Places in the story

Public places are marked on the map.

Heard in this episode