For nearly two decades, the family of Jerilyn Towers lived in a state of agonizing uncertainty. A 34-year-old mother, Jerilyn, a white female, was a woman deeply committed to her children, making her sudden disappearance all the more baffling and painful for those who knew and loved her. Her life was not without its struggles, but her devotion to her family was a constant.
That all changed on a cool autumn night in 1982, leaving a void that would not be filled with answers until the turn of the new millennium.
On the night of Saturday, October 16, 1982, after an evening of bowling with her family, Jerilyn decided to have a drink at the Gateway Lounge in her hometown of Newport, Maine. Her father dropped her off, expecting a call later to come and pick her up. Inside the bar, she met a man named James "Jimmy" Rodney Hicks. Witnesses later recalled seeing the two laughing and talking, with Hicks buying her drinks throughout the night. Around 1:00 a.m., they left the lounge together. Later, Jerilyn's father heard a loud vehicle in the driveway and, assuming she had gotten a ride home, went to bed. But the next morning, Jerilyn was not there. Her mother, June Tibbetts, frantic with worry, contacted the Newport Police.
The initial investigation into Jerilyn's disappearance quickly focused on James Hicks. When questioned by Newport Police Chief Jim Ricker, Hicks denied knowing anything about her whereabouts and acted erratically. The investigation into Jerilyn's case led police to re-examine the 1977 disappearance of Hicks's first wife, 23-year-old Jennie Hicks. In 1983, based on circumstantial evidence related to his wife's case, Hicks was arrested and later convicted of manslaughter for Jennie's death, serving six years of a ten-year sentence. However, there was not enough evidence to charge him in connection with Jerilyn's vanishing, and for years, her case went cold. Her family had her legally declared dead in 1992, but they never gave up hope for justice.
The break in the case came from an entirely different state. In 2000, James Hicks was facing a 55-year prison sentence in Lubbock, Texas, for aggravated robbery and assault of a 67-year-old woman whom he had planned to kill. Facing the prospect of a long sentence in a Texas prison, Hicks decided to negotiate. He contacted Maine authorities and offered a deal: he would confess to the murders of three women and lead them to their bodies in exchange for being allowed to serve his sentence in Maine. Hicks then confessed to killing his wife, Jennie Hicks, in 1977, Jerilyn Towers in 1982, and another woman, 40-year-old Lynn Willette, in 1996.
In October 2000, Hicks returned to Maine and, over two days, led investigators to the burial sites. He directed them to a shallow grave in Etna, where they unearthed Jerilyn's remains. Just 100 feet away, they found the remains of Jennie Hicks. Hicks admitted he had strangled Jerilyn from the back seat of his car after offering her a ride home from the bar. In a horrifying detail, he confessed to keeping her body for two weeks before dismembering and burying her. Her rings were found still on her skeletal fingers.
On November 17, 2000, James Rodney Hicks pleaded guilty to the murders of Jerilyn Towers and Lynn Willette. He was sentenced to two life sentences without the possibility of parole. During the sentencing, Hicks showed no remorse and offered no apology. The court heard a powerful victim impact statement from Jerilyn's daughter, Tammy. "I spent my life trying to remember what my mother sounded like, smelled like and felt like," she said, addressing Hicks directly. "But my mother didn't abandon me. You killed my mother, cut her up, and discarded her like garbage. I won't let you destroy my life, James Hicks. Today my roller coaster ride stops and I get off, leaving you behind."
The resolution of the case, while grim, finally brought a measure of closure to the families who had waited so long for the truth. James Hicks, one of Maine's only known serial killers, remains incarcerated at the Maine State Prison, serving multiple life sentences. The search for Jerilyn Towers was over, but the memory of a mother taken far too soon endures.
