TULSA — Forty years ago, one of the most shocking and terrible crimes in Oklahoma history kicked off an investigation that still remains open to this day.

Law enforcement hasn’t given up trying to find answers behind the murders of Lori Farmer, Michele Guse, and Denise Milner at a Girl Scout camp near Locust Grove, northeast of Tulsa on June 13, 1977.

Neither have journalists, and recently Tulsa World reporter Tim Stanley took up the gauntlet.

Stanley tells KRMG he approached the year-long project with a sense of urgency, because many of the people involved are aging.

He learned that for those involved in the case, the passage of several decades has done little to heal the wounds it opened.

“When you talk to the people who were there, and their memories even after forty years are still so fresh to them, and so are the emotions,” he told KRMG.

The challenge for him, and the other members of the team, was to stay as objective as possible even as they documented those memories and emotions.

"You can't help, as a writer or a reporter or a photojournalist, I think, being deeply moved as you hear them tell these stories. And that was something that I hoped to do with the stories that we wrote - and I think our guys definitely did with the video they produced - was capture that emotion, but to do it in a way that's respectful and sensitive, but just kind of allow our viewers, our readers today to kind of step in those folks' shoes and appreciate the story from their perspective a little more."
But, he admits, "you can't do a story like this without being emotionally affected by it."

Stanley and the team created a six-part series that dives deeply into the facts surrounding the case.

They also produced a documentary video, which runs a little over 11 minutes and does a compelling job of evoking the emotions that still run so deeply in those who still await answers.

There is still hope such answers may be forthcoming.

The OSBI sent out a statement Tuesday saying the case remains open.

It noted private efforts to raise money for additional DNA testing on evidence in the case, spearheaded by current Mayes County Sheriff Mike Reed.

The man who was arrested, charged, and tried for the murders was acquitted by a jury.

Gene Leroy Walker was sent back to prison to serve out a sentence on unrelated charges, and died of a heart attack just weeks after the trial ended.

And Stanley said he hopes his story will do more than just keep the story alive.

“Whether you believe Hart was the guy or not, here we are still waiting for answers, waiting for justice on behalf of these girls,” he said. “Let’s not do them the further injustice of forgetting them. Let’s remember them.”

And remember their names.

Lori Farmer.

Michele Guse.

Denise Milner.