
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 21, 1990                   TAG: 9006210315
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Short

REPORT: DEAD WOMAN HELD MONEY FOR DEALER

A woman whose body was found along with a former boyfriend's two weeks ago had been holding thousands of dollars for a drug dealer, a newspaper reported Wednesday.

Some of the friends of the dead woman, Deborah Ferguson, also said Ferguson had told them the money had been stolen from her apartment, The Richmond News Leader said.

The drug dealer, identified by the newspaper as Mark Miller, 30, of Richmond, was arrested in January and pleaded guilty May 14 in Hanover County Circuit Court to conspiracy to distribute drugs in connection with a marijuana distribution ring. Miller has been in the Hanover Jail since pleading guilty and faces sentencing July 16.

Miller has acknowledged to police that Ferguson was keeping money for him, the newspaper cited unidentified sources as saying. Miller also told police that a few thousand dollars was not returned, the newspaper said.

Ferguson, a rising senior at Virginia Commonwealth University, and James Sherrin, a former VCU student, disappeared May 18. Their decomposed bodies were found June 5 in a wooded area near U.S. 360.

- Associated Press

by CNB