Closing Time: The 1993 Be-Lo Murders

By Jeb Bohn

June 6, 1993, began like any other day in the small town of Windsor, North Carolina. By the end of the day, nothing in this community will ever be the same.

As 6 o'clock hits, the employees of the town's Be-Lo grocery store are going through their closing tasks. A cleaning crew loads their equipment in as they prepare to wax the store's floor.

What they don't know is that someone else is in the store with them.

With the sun falling below the horizon, a call is placed to 911. The caller, fighting to get each word out, has been shot. Police descend on the store to find a grisly scene: three people are dead, two more are seriously injured.

The search begins for the killer, an investigation that carries on almost 30 years later. Leads carry police all over the country but the break they so desperately need continues to elude them.

What happened in the store that night and where has the killer gone?

Will the perpetrator of these scary unsolved murders ever be brought to justice?

Looking at a list of unsolved murders, this case is almost forgotten. Don't let this terrible crime or its victims be forgotten.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeb Bohn
• Release date: Jun 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201574420

Jeb Bohn

Jeb Bohn is a writer, drummer, and author of the Herman Ingram series. A lover of storytelling, Jeb has spent close to a decade enthralling readers across multiple genres. Through emphasizing humanity, humor, and character, he crafted the sarcastic journalist-turned-unlikely hero Herman Ingram. The character has since appeared in three novels, with more in the future. Jeb received the title of Best American Thriller Author at the 2023 Media Innovator Awards. He also captured Best Sport History Author for North Carolina hockey chronicle, A Storm In Carolina. The book was further named as "One of the Best New Professional Hockey Books" by BookAuthority. When Jeb isn't watching the Carolina Hurricanes or his repeated viewings of RoboCop, he works from his home in Greenville, North Carolina. In his downtime, he enjoys family trips with his significant other and two children. He also makes a mean pot of chili.

Book preview

Closing Time

CLOSING TIME

THE 1993 BE-LO MURDERS

JEB BOHN

Copyright © 2021 by Jeb Bohn

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

CONTENTS

Introduction

Chapter 1

A Crack In The Peace

Chapter 2

We’re At BE-LO’s

Chapter 3

The Investigation

Chapter 4

Possible Escape Routes

Chapter 5

Questions

Chapter 6

The Case Remains Active

Photos

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Dedicated to the lives and memories of the victims:

The victims of the Be-Lo Massacre

INTRODUCTION

As you traverse the Cashie River north through Bertie County, North Carolina, you’ll arrive at the Cashie River Boardwalk in the town of Windsor. With a population of just under 4,000, Windsor is a small, close-knit community. It’s the type of place where residents can’t walk down the street without being bombarded by familiar faces. There are no strangers in this town.

On the evening of June 6, 1993, things change.

At 409 West Granville Street sits the Be-Lo grocery store. Part of a regional chain, the Windsor Be-Lo is one of the town’s hubs. Residents chat in the aisles, swapping stories as they shop for the week’s provisions. The parking lot isn’t enormous, but that’s okay since many of the shoppers live within walking distance from the store. 

They are unaware that a stranger—filled with ill intent—has come to town. This stranger is malicious and will leave the town and its residents irreversibly altered.

When he leaves, three people will be dead, two more hospitalized, and the townspeople’s sense of security gone.

Despite living most of my life within an hour of Windsor, I only discovered this case somewhat recently. Once I learned about it, I haven’t been able to let go. Heinous crimes go unsolved all the time, but this one has stuck with me. Perhaps it’s because of my proximity; perhaps it’s the details of what occurred that terrible night in early June. I suspect it’s a mixture of the two however there’s something else, something that really surprised me: few people outside of Windsor are aware of this event.

That leads us to a question you might have, certainly one I’ve had to answer for myself: why? Why write about this? Why now?

Thankfully, there is a straightforward answer, one that I came to easily. 

Allow me to explain.

Above all else, I want to raise awareness about this case. Three people lost their lives, leaving behind loved ones who have struggled for nearly three decades with no answers. This left three survivors with psychological scars, mental wounds that haunted them years later. This crime shattered lives, families, and the peace of mind of an entire town. It’s incomprehensible to imagine.

There is also hope that maybe—just maybe—someone will read this who has some shred of information about what happened and will come forward. 

To follow that up, it’s important to note that, despite its age, this case is still active and open. While that has made gathering information difficult, there is still the hope and belief that authorities will solve this case. Upon learning that the case was still active, I debated shelving this project. Instead, I put out what