Governor’s mistress meets murder victim, vanishes
On May 27, 2022, Rebecca Pauline Gary, who family members say was the mistress of a Louisiana governor for fifteen years, may turn sixty-six. However, most believe someone murdered the 32-year-old college clerk the week she vanished, days before New Year’s Eve thirty-four years ago.
They don’t lynch in Tangipahoa Parish anymore
Stumping on the parish courthouse lawn in Shreveport on September 31, 1932, gubernatorial candidate Dudley J. LeBlanc said, “They no longer lynch people in Tangipahoa Parish. They don’t have to. Their newspapers do it for them.”
Hitman’s rap sheet only scratches the surface
In two earlier installments, we reviewed the early criminal history of the accused Dixie Mafia hitman killed in St. Tammany Parish in 1980. Readers responded to those reports, wanting to know more and asking for evidence of Charlie Thrash’s misdeeds. What follows is the complete Louisiana State Police rap sheet of Charles Olan Thrash.
Covington hitman began career as armed robber
In 1956, Charlie Thrash led Louisiana State Police on a thirty-mile chase, driving a stolen 1951 brown Pontiac. Racing from Bunkie, Louisiana to Alexandria, the 25-year-old crashed through police roadblocks in two parishes with patrol cars from three jurisdictions following bumper-to-bumper. The chase ended when the Pontiac T-boned a state police car blocking Highway 71