3 MEN PLEAD INNOCENT IN 1980 RAINBOW SLAYINGS

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

DATE: FRIDAY, January 22, 1993                   TAG: 9301220314
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MARLINTON, W.VA.                                LENGTH: Short
3 MEN PLEAD INNOCENT IN 1980 RAINBOW SLAYINGS
Three men pleaded innocent Thursday in the 1980 slayings of two women who were hitchhiking to a counterculture gathering in Pocahontas County.
The county grand jury indicted five men Jan. 13 on two counts of murder and one conspiracy count that implies a crime of a sexual nature.
Jacob Beard, 46, of Crescent City, Fla.; Richard Fowler, 40, of Gordonsville, Va.; and Arnold Cutlip, 55, whose residence is unknown, were arraigned in Circuit Court, said special prosecutor Walt Weiford.
The three could face up to life in prison without chance of parole if convicted, Weiford said.
Fowler and Cutlip each posted $100,000 bond afterward and Beard was in the process of doing so, said Earl Michael, the county's circuit clerk.
Two other suspects were not arraigned.
Gerald Brown, 51, of Droop Mountain, is scheduled to appear in court Monday, Weiford said. Extradition proceedings are beginning for William McCoy, 36, who is in a Nevada prison on an unrelated conviction, Weiford said.
The five suspects were living in Pocahontas County in June 1980, when Vickie Durian, 26, of Wellman, Iowa, and Nancy Santomero, 19, of Huntington, N.Y., were slain, Weiford said.
The women's bodies were found off a mountainous road in Hillsboro, about 70 miles east of Charleston. But indictments were delayed over recanted confessions, charges of witnesses being bullied by police and other problems, Weiford said.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB