Texts From Walmart Lead Man to Confess to 1997 Murder
The Charlotte Observer reports the bizarre story of a man who drove cross-country this June to confess to murdering a woman and dumping her body in a river in 1997. Matthew Gibson, 55, was driven to confess after he got texts and calls from Walmart about prescriptions for Anita Townshed. He thought Townshed was the woman he killed.
Per the Observer:
Gibson ... thought someone knew about the murder ... and was toying with him. [He] told the detective that he began receiving text messages and voicemails from Walmart telling an Anita Townshed that her prescription was ready. ...
Gibson later received an envelope with a Walmart advertisement in it but no return name or address. He felt someone was monitoring his calls, he said.
Gibson's conclusion: Townshed must have been the woman he killed. Now he felt someone might have put "a contract on his head."
"In his own mind … somebody knew what happened after all these years," [Detective Alicia] Marquez said.
Gibson drove from North Carolina to confess in Arizona, where he allegedly murdered the woman. Her name was actually Barbara Agnew. Gibson told cops that one night in 1997, he invited her back to his trailer and later bludgeoned her with a Maglite flashlight when she wouldn't leave.
