LAURINBURG — Kimberly Breeden said she still recalls some of the final words she spoke to her mother, Dora Breeden, four decades ago. “I love you,” were among them.
Shortly after, Dora Breeden along with Pat Gentry were shot while inside the P&D Mart. The store, which the two owned, was then set on fire, destroying much of the evidence.
“It was a horrible, horrible scene. The building was burnt … Nobody deserves to die that way,” said Randy Dover, captain of the Criminal Investigation Division at the Scotland County Sheriff’s Office.
Forty years later on the anniversary of their death, the Scotland County Sheriff’s Office has reopened the case at the request of Breeden’s family and seeks to put fresh eyes and a new perspective on the unsolved double homicide.
“We’re asking if anybody remembers anything happening or has heard anything will be willing to come forward and speak with us … These families need answers,” Dover said during a press conference held on Monday across the street from the scene of the crime, now the Nic’s Pic Kwik on Aberdeen Road in Laurinburg.
The incident happened around midnight on Nov. 18, 1984. Both were shot in the head and found when the building was set aflame. Dover said the department went through the entire case file and there’s “not a lot of evidence in this case.”
“A lot of evidence got destroyed … There’s some things we can do that we’re doing and we’re working on it as we speak,” Dover said.
Something that stood out while reviewing the case was that no money was taken.
“That’s very strange. It looks like a hit to be honest,” Dover said.
‘We miss her’
Kimberly Breeden said that her family deserves closure.
“We’ve lived with this for 40 years with no answers, no understanding of why and it’s time for us to get answers,” Breeden said. “We miss her …. Justice needs to be served for what happened to her. She did not deserve it. Pat did not deserve it.”
Breeden, who was 16 at the time of her mother’s death, described her mother as being a “very caring” woman who loved her family.
“There was not a day we didn’t know we were loved,” Breeden said. “She was a school teacher, an educated middle child in a very large family … My mom was just a good person. Running a store was not what she was built to do. She was just good at it. She loved people.”
“I was blessed to have 16 years with her … There’s not a day I don’t think about her,” Breeden said.
Patricia “Pat” Gentry, Pat Gentry’s ex-wife, described him as being well-liked and a good father who worked hard.
“I think basically he was a good man,” Patricia Gentry said. “We were divorced at the time but we still had many, many conversations about the children and what was best for them.”
Kimberly Breeden has heard a lot of speculations over the years about what could have happened.
“There’s been all kinds of things (said),” Kimberly said. “The only thing that we do know for sure is that it was a professional hit. Both were killed the same way. Nothing was taken.”
Pat Gentry has had her suspicions.
“There are things that point to a certain direction but things are not always what you think they are,” she said. “Hard evidence might shoot you in a totally different direction. Who knows.”
’The least little thing’
Capt. Dover has been banking on people coming forward who were around during that time.
“We’re hoping that with this being out people will remember and come forward,” he said. “There are people that wouldn’t talk back then that maybe will talk now due to some circumstances.”
No detail is too small in a cold case like this.
“The least little thing could be the biggest thing … People talk. We get a lot of hearsay but sometimes hearsay is gold to us … We’ll listen to anything,” Dover said.
Both the Breeden and Gentry families are seeking answers and asked for the public’s help.
“There were six children affected by this and that’s been a struggle, all their lives that’s been a struggle. To find out who did it won’t change that. It won’t make that go away but it would give some closure,” Pat Gentry said. “Literally if there’s anybody who remembers any detail or whatever please just let us know.”
“If you know anything please come and tell us. Maybe there’s been reasons you haven’t come forward before now but put it on your heart to come forward because this family deserves closure,” Kimberly Breeden said.