As a jury deliberates the fate of former Oakfield resident Steven Rebert -- life in prison or the death penalty for killing a Pennsylvania couple -- Chief Deputy Jerome Brewster is hoping one more piece of evidence will emerge to help authorities convict Rebert of killing Bill Fickel in August 2005.
"If in fact there were people out there who were afraid of him, they now know that he's either going to spend life in prison or get the death penalty," Brewster said. "He's no longer a threat to them."
Brewster has believed throughout the investigation that there was a passenger in the truck being driven by the man who shot Fickel.
If Rebert is the killer, that person may be the key to solving the case.
A cigarette butt gathered as evidence at the scene of the shooting, Brewster said, was found to have Rebert's DNA on it.
"We've been about where we have been with the case," Brewster said. "We were sort of waiting to see if the trial (in Pennsylvannia) might yield us anything else on Mr. Rebert, and at this point it doesn't look like it will. We're proceeding with what we have and we'll be meeting with the DA in the near future to see if we can get going with what we have."
Investigators are always hoping for new evidence to make a case stronger, Brewster said, and eyewitness testimony would certainly help formulate a case against Fickel's killer.
"We're hoping somebody will come forward in the next couple of weeks who decides to cooperate and then our case will be much stronger," Brewster said.
He added, "and, of course, there's still that $100,000 reward out there."
Meanwhile, the jury that convicted Rebert of killing Wayne and Vicky Shugar on April 10 is hearing testimony from people affected by the case, from members of the Shugar family to Rebert's mother and father.
