In late spring 2018 Ricky Allen Gibson, 44, was reported missing from Neon, Kentucky. His partially decomposed body was found on a strip mine at the top of Haymond Hill on the morning of May 3, and the missing-person investigation became a homicide probe.

Within days two people were arrested and charged: 38-year-old Clifford Jermaine Caudill of Neon and 41-year-old Dedra Keathley of Joes Creek in Pike County, both facing murder and tampering with physical evidence. According to statements Caudill reportedly made at the Hazard State Police Post, an altercation in the bathroom at 27 Welch Hollow involved Gibson and two others, and Gibson was shot and killed there. Caudill said the body was then moved to the remote strip mine, and investigators believe a third person helped dispose of the body.

Keathley has been described as uncooperative and denying involvement. Authorities also said they were searching for Caudill’s brother Braden Uriah Stamper, who had lived at the same address and had not been seen since the homicide. Did anyone in the Neon area know Gibson’s whereabouts or see activity around Welch Hollow or Haymond Hill that spring?