In the spring of 1984, a wave of terror swept across Oklahoma and neighboring states, leaving a trail of devastation. At the center of this maelstrom of violence was a 37-year-old woman from Poteau, Oklahoma, named Margaret Ann Bell Lydick. Her story is a harrowing account of a life cut short by a brutal predator, a cross-state ordeal of unimaginable horror, and a long, painful wait for justice.
On the evening of May 7, 1984, Margaret encountered a man named Gary Alan Walker in Poteau.
Walker, a recently paroled convict, had already committed a murder earlier that same day in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. After meeting Margaret, he abducted her at knifepoint in her own Cadillac, beginning a terrifying journey that would span several states. For days, she was subjected to torture and repeated assaults as Walker drove through Arkansas and Tennessee, before finally reaching Kentucky. The full horror of what she endured may never be known, but it was a prolonged and brutal ordeal that ended with her murder.
For a month, Margaret's whereabouts remained a mystery, a source of anguish for her family in their pleasant suburban Poteau home. The search came to a tragic end on June 8, 1984. Her body was discovered, left in an abandoned barn and hidden beneath a haystack near Princeton, Kentucky, hundreds of miles from where her nightmare began. The discovery confirmed the worst fears of her loved ones and the authorities who had been searching for her.
The man responsible for Margaret’s death, Gary Alan Walker, was identified as a serial killer who came to be known as "The Roaming Rapist." His violent spree in May 1984 resulted in the proven murders of five people: one man and four women, including Margaret. Walker was captured in Tulsa on June 2, 1984, just days before Margaret's body was found. His arrest came after a multi-agency investigation pieced together the trail of his crimes. Once in custody, Walker's braggadocio led him to confess and even guide investigators to the locations of his victims' bodies.
Walker's journey through the justice system was complex. He faced charges in multiple jurisdictions for his string of violent crimes, which included first-degree murder, kidnapping, and rape. For the murder of Margaret Ann Bell Lydick, he was tried in Kentucky in August 1986. He reached a plea agreement and was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years. For his other crimes in Oklahoma, he received multiple life sentences and, for the murder of 63-year-old Eddie Cash, a death sentence.
For nearly 16 years, the families of Walker’s victims waited for the final measure of justice. On January 13, 2000, Gary Alan Walker, aged 46, was executed by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary. Before his execution, he reportedly apologized to the families of the people he killed. Approximately 30 relatives of his five victims, including the family of Margaret Lydick, watched the procedure—some in an adjacent room and others via closed-circuit television—bringing a final, somber end to a dark chapter that began on a spring day in 1984.
