PAWHUSKA, Okla. — A son desperate for answers in his mother's murder has reached out for help bringing attention to the decades-old cold case.
Joannie Goodwin was only 18 years old when she was killed in 1996. Her son, Bobby Neighbors, was just 7 months old at the time of her death.
"My mother was brutally killed and thrown in the creek like a piece of trash," Neighbors said.
Those painful words capture the harsh reality that Neighbors lives with every day. His mother, a young woman who should have had decades ahead to watch her baby grow up, was stolen from this world far too soon.
Neighbors was robbed of a mother's love when he was just 7 months old. While investigators have worked over the years to solve her cold case and bring her killer or killers to justice, his pain continues because the case remains unsolved.
Recently, I received a heartfelt letter from Neighbors, asking me to help shine a light on his mother's case.
The family will never forget that devastating day in 1996 when Joannie's body was discovered near the Pawhuska Light Plant on September 29.
Some fishermen along Bird Creek found Joannie's body. She had been weighted down with cinder blocks, tied with an electrical cable and shot in the stomach.
At one point, investigators thought they had their breakthrough when they made an arrest. But heartbreak followed when prosecutors determined they simply didn't have enough evidence to move forward and later dropped the charges against the female suspect due to insufficient evidence.
When asked what he believes drove someone to commit such a senseless act, Neighbors' answer revealed the incomprehensible nature of his loss.
"I think it was just pure jealousy. It doesn't make any sense. I can't fathom why somebody would kill somebody just over jealousy," Neighbors said.
There's a dedicated investigator who refuses to let Joannie be forgotten. Tammy Ferrari is the special agent with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation who is currently working Joannie's case with renewed determination.
She carries hope that advances in DNA technology will finally unlock the answers this family desperately needs.
"There was evidence that was tested back in the day back in 96 and subsequent years and then evidence has been resubmitted I believe back in 2023 is when I took over the case, and so I went back through and tried to recover any evidence that was still locatable and then resubmitted that to our lab and we are trying to get everything reprocessed for anything that could be redone with all of the updates and the new technology we have with DNA," Ferrari said.
Joannie Goodwin was more than a victim. She was a young mother with dreams, a daughter, and a human being who deserved so much more than the violence that ended her life.
If you have any information about the death of Joannie Goodwin, no matter how small it may seem, please reach out to the OSBI. You could be the key to finally giving Neighbors the answers he's been searching for his entire life.
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