Still hiding, police say, is the person who gunned down 47-year-old family man and avid outdoorsman Gary Russell Short Sr. on the morning of May 20, 1988.

All investigators really know is that Short was somehow lured to a wooded trail in the Gladyfork section of Pound, saw an armed man hiding in the brush, and took a shotgun blast to the chest.

Family members and investigators suspect Short might have been killed because he saw something he shouldn?t have, possibly a heavy equipment theft ring in action. Or, the shooting might have been done by an acquaintance lusting after Short?s wife.

Wise County Commonwealth?s Attorney Ron Elkins hopes that a special grand jury scheduled for Feb. 25 and 26 might pave a new path for investigators to follow.

Nearly 21 years since Short?s death, the grand jury marks the first time evidence will be brought to court. Investigators plan to question a number of witnesses, and hope the special grand jury can pry information from long-closed lips.

?I?ve found that people are more inclined to tell the truth when they are under oath,? Elkins said in a telephone interview.

TIME

Teresa Caudell, of Abingdon, Va., was 27 years old when her father was killed. Now, she is 47, just a few months older than Short was when he was killed.

?You realize how young he was,? Caudell said Wednesday. ?All those grandkids ... he never knew.?

Hours before Short died, he drove his wife to work, and was then supposed to meet someone to paint a boat. For some reason, he drove to a wooded trail leading to a strip mining site, a path in the opposite direction of where he was supposed to be.

His son, Gary ?Rusty? Short Jr., was part of the search party that found the body. The father was discovered face down on a dirt trail. He was heading back to his truck, parked on the strip mining trail, when he died.

?What was it that got Daddy up there?? Rusty Short asked Wednesday. ?It had to be something real good to get him up there.?

Elkins said a group of ?Wise County citizens looking at the evidence? might do a better job of plotting the next investigative step than would ?just one or two people.? Initially, the special grand jury was scheduled to meet today and Thursday, but was postponed until later this month because one of the lead prosecutors on the case is attending a family death.

As why a grand jury has been formed after all these years, Elkins said there are ?a few new things? to present to fresh eyes.

News of the grand jury has provided the Short family with hope that an end to the mystery might be near.

?I?m sure we won?t like what we learn or we hear, but we still need closure,? Caudell said.

SUSPECTS

When asked about her emotions after learning her dad was killed, Caudell left out the usual adjectives of shock, loss, and shattered. Instead, she uttered a person?s name as her first thought. It is the name of a family acquaintance, someone described as a regular fixture on hunting trips and at family fish fries.

Months before the shooting, Caudell said, that person pulled her aside and voiced love for her mother, but said he ?would never do anything with her unless something happened to [Short].?

It?s a conversation that Caudell said still haunts her.

?I have lived with a lot of guilt over the years for not saying something,? Caudell said.

According to the autopsy report, the path of the buckshot pellets reveal that Short threw his arms up in a defensive posture moments before being shot. His upper chest took the brunt of the blast.

Short turned and ran, dying before reaching his truck.

Rusty Short recalls finding broken branches roughly 18 yards ahead of where his dad was shot, suggesting a makeshift, camouflaged hunting blind.

?We know that he [the acquaintance] knows something about daddy?s murder,? Rusty Short said.

Few clues, other than the body and the hunting blind, were left. Although investigators did rule out the possibility of a hunting accident.

Virginia State Police First Sgt. Roger Owens, an original case investigator, said they had ?absolutely nothing to go with.?

There were footprints leading from the blind to the body, however. The day after the shooting, a police K-9 would lead investigators from the body, through the woods, and to the house of the very person the Short family now holds suspect.

The only problem, Owens said, is that the suspect had been seen in the woods the night of the killing, after Short?s body was found and before the search dog was used.

?We just really don?t know if the dog was trailing something [from the killing] or he picked up that other trail ... got the trails mixed up,? Owens said.

Still, Owens said: ?I think this particular person would be of interest to the grand jury.?

A DIFFERENT LEAD

There are other suspects. They are tied to the October, 1987, murder of a night security guard months before Short died.

In that case, the guard was supposed to have been killed because he witnessed the illegal actions of a heavy equipment theft ring. Members of a motorcycle gang were hired to keep the guard quiet.

Investigators theorized then that if the guard saw something he shouldn?t have, maybe Short did too.

Eventually, three people were convicted for killing the guard. But no connection to Short has never been identified.

Yet investigators remain suspicious of the guard?s killers.

?We never could eliminate them,? from Short?s death, Owens said. ?We couldn?t prove they did it, either.?

Because grand juries are closed hearings, it could be months before the public learns if an interesting suspect is picked. Even if the grand jury picks a suspect, it would be fall until any public indictments are made, Elkins said.

Until then, all the Short family can do is wait, just as they?ve been doing for more than 20 years.

?There?s one thing we know,? Caudell said. ?It was pre-meditated murder. It was planned. I want to know why.?

[email protected] | (276) 791-0698