(Editor’s note: This is the first story in an occasional Morning Journal series re-examining the many unsolved murders and suspicious deaths that have occurred in Columbiana County. If there is a specific death you would like us to feature, or if you have information that might lead to solving these crimes, please email it to news@mojonews.com)

LISBON – It was 11 years ago on a rainy August morning that the highway patrol responded to what was believed to be a vehicle accident on Greenwood Road.

Once they arrived, troopers realized this was not a standard vehicle accident – the man dead inside the vehicle had been murdered.

County officials were notified and an investigation was launched. More than a decade later, the case of who killed 37-year-old Michael Williams of Rogers remains open.

According to the reports filed that day, and later, the county sheriff’s office received a report at 10:30 a.m. Aug. 30, 2005, that the patrol responded to a traffic crash earlier that morning and the man inside the vehicle was dead.

Troopers notified other agencies once it was believed that the injuries to the man’s body were not consistent with that of the crash.

The vehicle was partially over an embankment and still in drive, with Williams slumped over the wheel when the patrol arrived, according to the original county sheriff’s report from that day.

Current County Sheriff Ray Stone said it was raining heavily that day and by the time deputies arrived a tent had been placed over the vehicle by the patrol.

At the time of the murder, David L. Smith was serving as county sheriff and was on scene alongside Detective Sgt. Andy Sweeney, according to the original sheriff’s report.

The report also stated that trooper Tim Jones told sheriff’s deputies on the scene that he had put the vehicle in park and shut the engine off while Tri-County Ambulance was examining the driver, identified as Williams.

The crash occurred not far from Williams’ home at 45284 Greenwood Road.

County Coroner Investigator Fran Rudibaugh was also called to the scene, and had Williams transported by Greeniesen Ambulance to what was known as the Salem Community Hospital, now the Salem Regional Medical Center.

Williams’ vehicle was then towed to the county sheriff’s garage.

A copy of William’s official death certificate, signed Aug. 30, 2005, by county Coroner Dr. William A. Graham, ruled the death a homicide.

Information listed on the death certificate determined the cause of death to be multiple blunt impacts to the head, trunk and extremities with brain injuries.

Graham wrote on the certificate that Williams was “beaten with a hard object.”

An autopsy was performed, according to the report, with the findings available prior to the cause of the death being determined. No other information was provided by Graham, due to the fact that the murder remains unsolved.

Williams’ cousin, Belinda Puchadja is still looking for answers, alongside her family.

“As a family member you’re looking for someone to blame We want answers. It’s not going to bring Mike back or make things easier (to accept). We just want to know someone will be punished for taking Mike’s life,” she said.

Puchadja believes Mike may have pulled over to help someone someone he possibly knew, since his car window was partially down. Due to the fact that the window was down, most of the physical evidence was washed away by the torrential rain that day.

She also believes Williams was killed by more than one person, since he was in such great physical shape.

Stone said the sheriff’s office followed up on every possible lead, and spoke with at least six suspects, but nothing ever panned out.

“We don’t have any viable suspects to question at this point,” he said.

Frustrated with the lack of progress in solving the murder, Williams’ family hired a private investigator shortly after the death, but it also led to a dead end.

Williams’ mother, Shirley Winn, asked the Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI) to get involved, which it did, but the bureau confirmed the original investigators had done everything they could and followed every lead.

Puchadja said Winn didn’t believe the case would ever be solved in her lifetime. Unfortunately, that prediction came true when Winn passed away in January of this year at the age of 70.

Many rumors began flying around relating to the death over the years, and the family became “bombarded” with people claiming to have information, Puchadja said.

“Everything from psychics to ‘my brother’s uncle’s nephew’s best friend heard…'” she said.

The family actually did attempt to get help from one psychic, Phil Jordan, from Court TV, and another psychic provided descriptions of two men that closely resembled two county men with criminal records, one of whom died in prison; the other was given a polygraph by the Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI) and passed.

“I’m telling you, we had people coming out of the woodwork,” she said of psychics, who charged $600 to $700.

In the end, the family got more information from the BCI than the sheriff and prosecutor, she said.

She explained the family turned to the BCI and a private investigator to get a “fresh set of eyes” on the matter.

“Someone may see something that was overlooked before,” or be able to look at the same evidence and be able to put the puzzle pieces together, she said.

Some of the speculated reasons relating to Williams’ death were a jealous boyfriend theory, or a drug deal gone bad both of which Puchadja dismissed.

One possible suspect was an ex-boyfriend of Williams’ girlfriend at the time, since there had been a “major argument” between the two men over the woman at some point, but Puchadja isn’t convinced.

“I never felt that, I just felt it was something else,” she said,

As for any drug involvement, she didn’t see her cousin getting into that kind of lifestyle since he was into weight lifting and keeping himself in shape.

The BCI did check into that possibility, but nothing came of it, she added.

She also said that on the day of Williams’ death he was supposed to put a roof on his barn with the help of two friends, but they never showed. The men reportedly showed up after the murder, and others saw them taking stuff from Williams’ property, she said.

One of the men had also fought with Williams and allegedly owed him money, she added.

The only other county sheriff’s report released to the Journal relating to Williams was one made on Sept. 2, in which a deputy found a black Ford pickup truck belonging to Williams parked at a gravel lane on Greenwood Road. The deputy found that a family friend had parked it there to restrict access to the lane and onto Williams’ property.

Sometime after Williams’ death Puchadja founded the Columbiana County Families of Homicide Victims (CCFHV) to bring attention to unsolved murders and suspicious deaths.

She has since taken a break from the group to focus on obtaining a bachelor’s degree in criminology from Kent State.

She has also been disappointed with the fact that the group began attracting “weirdos” or murder groupies, who had no connection to any of the deaths.

She hopes the criminology degree will help her come up with ways to reinvigorate the CCFHV to take it to the “next level, to come up with other things to do.”

One thing would be to focus more on assisting victims themselves in addition to keeping murder in the public eye.

“He won’t be forgotten as long as I’m around,” Puchadja said of Williams.

Sheriff Stone did not wish to comment further on the murder without county Prosecutor Robert Herron being present and other county investigators. Herron and the Journal left messages for each other but he never returned the follow-up call from the newspaper.

kwhite@mojonews.com

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Staff writers Tom Giambroni, Jo Ann Bobby Gilbert and Deanne Johnson contributed to this report.