My father's story

[LunaChick]

and his killers story.


http://cbs3.com/local/Charles.Uffelman.Philadelphia.2.647957.html



My mother, sister and my oldest brother are in the video. I wasn't able to be at the interview because I had to take hubby to the doctor. I"m so angry about all of this.

[Taterbo]

I am so very sorry you and your family is having to go through all of this again...but hopefully they will put him away for good this time..amd your family will finally be able to be at peace.

I do believe this is the man they just caught north of me here in Fla..

[PrincessArky]

OMG thats so sad I am sorry for your terrible loss. I hope they are able to keep this guy off the streets this time

[dv8grl]

WOw. I hope your family finally gets justice.

[Army-Mom]

I am so very very sorry..I know what you are going though right now. I lost my brother to murder also and he was a cop..

[pepperpot]

So sorry, such a nightmare that didn't have to happen...:(

[gmyers]

I'm so sorry for you and your families loss. I really hope they put him away for good this time. I feel for the other families too. What happened wouldn't have happened if he had been convicted the first time.

[LunaChick]

Thanks for the thoughts everyone. We're seriously thinking of going to his trial. What wasn't said in the interview was that he called my mother last year on Valentine's day out of the blue. It was right around the time he is suspected of killing Blevins. He also expressed his sympathy for my brother's death. He has been following our family all of these years. I think he was going to go after my mother. Of course we can't prove that, just a gut feeling.

[gmyers]

Thats scary. I'm glad they caught him because him calling your family is really creepy. He could have done something to her.

[hunny]

praying for Justice

[Pepsi4me]

I'm so sorry for your loss.

[mosdata1]

I am so sorry for your family's loss. What's even worse is that creep was free to kill again. I am happy he has been caught again & hope this time, they put him away for life! I hope the appellate (sp?) board is proud of themselves since they release this cold-blooded killer the first time.

[LunaChick]

An update to the story. The police have him on three other murders and possibly two more.

At this link, you can see two videos with voice overs by my mother.( Joan Uffelman) The videos have pictures of me and my family. In the one picture where my mother was sitting on the arm of the sofa, she was sitting next to my brother who passed away from cancer last year on the day of the super bowl. That picture was taken in January of 2001 when I got back from Texas. I'm the one with the long blonde hair.

Please, if you pray, chant or whatever your beliefs, please, please ask for justice for these poor families who recently lost loved ones. If only Philadelphia did it's job 30 years ago....


http://extras.journalnow.com/grassycreek/multimedia/multimediaindex.html

Here is another link which can be found on the above link but it's more direct. More pictures of our family.

http://extras.journalnow.com/grassycreek/series/chapter2/index.html

[ElleGee]

I watched the videos. What a freaking nightmare this must be

[CLARKS4]

I pray for Justice. I'm so sorry that you guys have to keep reliving this.

[Jolie Rouge]

Our prayers are with you and your family ...

[LunaChick]

Thanks. My only wish is that these families can find some kind of justice and at some point, some peace. It's a terrible thing to have to go through and you just never really get over it. You move on and live but it's always there when an event comes up or a birthday....

[LunaChick]

Update!


INDEPENDENCE, Va.

Freddie Hammer, accused of killing three men during a robbery at a Christmas-tree farm in Grayson County, Va., was in jail awaiting his capital murder trial when he made a deal with an inmate who was soon to be released.

Hammer told the inmate that $10,000 was buried in a barn at a campground. A rifle was there, too, hidden under bales of fencing. Hammer told him that if he found the rifle and got rid of it, he would give him $2,000.

Hammer's offer ended up costing him more than he expected.

The inmate wrote a letter to his girlfriend saying that he was going to be coming into some money when he got out of jail.

But the letter never reached his girlfriend. Instead, the inmate threw it away.

Guards found the letter in the trash. And when investigators questioned him, the inmate told them what Hammer had told him.

On May 5, investigators went to the barn at a private campground in Cripple Creek, Va., where Hammer had owned a camper.

Five feet from the inside corner of the barn, just as Hammer had described, officers dug down and found two cigar boxes filled with rolled coins, money that had been stolen from the safe at the Christmas-tree farm. Beneath the boxes they found a Yadkin Valley Bank bag containing damp, moldy cash.

Beneath rolls of fence wire, investigators found the murder weapon.

It is a .22-magnum rifle with a broken scope. The scope matched broken scope pieces found at the door of Ron Hudler's house.

A trace of the rifle's serial number showed that Hammer had purchased the rifle new in 1994 at a hardware store in Jefferson, N.C.

Faced with the new evidence, Hammer admitted yesterday in Grayson County Circuit Court that he had killed the men during a robbery, just as authorities had said when they arrested him a few days after the killings. He entered guilty pleas to five counts of capital murder and other charges in connection with the deaths and robbery.

He was sentenced to five life sentences without the possibility of parole, as well as two more life terms.

He was also ordered to pay fines of $600,000.

Hammer, 49, of Crumpler, went to steal a safe at Ron Hudler's Christmas-tree farm on Jan. 24, 2008, and killed Ron Hudler, 73; his son, Fred Hudler, 44; and a farm employee, John Miller Jr., 25. He shot all three in the head. Authorities said that two other firearms were used in the crimes and that Hammer had disposed of them.

"What happened that day should not have happened, and I'm sorry," Hammer told the victims' family members in court just before he was sentenced. "I went there with the intention of doing a burglary…. It was going to be in and out."

The trial was not expected to get under way until later this year or in 2010, but prosecutors said that the surprise deal was proposed to them Wednesday. Attorneys were still negotiating details over the course of more than two hours yesterday morning.

Hammer killed three people, but there were more than three capital charges because Virginia law allows charges to be filed for various elements of the crime. And although the road to the Christmas-tree farm begins in North Carolina and the case involved men with primarily Ashe County ties, the killings happened at a house about 200 yards into Virginia.

Douglas Vaught, Grayson County commonwealth's attorney, said that there was enough evidence and that the crimes were heinous enough to support a jury's verdict of death. He said that members of the victims' families were consulted before the plea was entered.

"They also voiced the sentiment that a sentence of life in prison as an admitted murderer without possibility of parole could be in some aspects a worse punishment than death," he said.

Inside court, some family members cried quietly when prosecutors described how Hammer had killed the men.

"I probably deserve to die, whatever," Hammer said. "If you read the Bible, to live is Christ and to die is for gain. Sometimes I wish I was dead for what I did, but I can't change that. Mr. Hud*ler was very good to me."

Hammer had worked as a handyman years ago for Ron Hudler. In the past, Hammer had also expressed warm feelings for Fred Hudler.

He said in court that he had never met John Miller Jr. before the day he killed him. Miller left behind a wife and baby.

"I would ask that his wife would find it in their heart to forgive me," Hammer said. "It was something that never should have happened."

Vaught also laid out new evidence in court.

He said that two store clerks in Elk Creek, Va., saw Hammer when he pulled his truck in to get fuel on a road heading from Cripple Creek back to Ashe County on the day of the killings.

The clerks had never seen Hammer before, but they noted the truck's sign for his Freddie P.'s firewood business.

The sign said, "Here comes Freddie P.," and one of the clerks read it aloud to the other when Hammer pulled in.

They noticed that he had dirt and leaves on his clothes, as if he had been in the woods, Vaught said.

Authorities also consider Hammer a suspect in the disappearance and presumed death of his nephew Jimmy Blevins. Hammer was the last person seen with Blevins before he disappeared on Feb. 24, 2007.

Authorities had also wanted to question Hammer in connection with the unsolved killing of Tim Shatley on Nov. 19, 2005. Shatley was shot on a bridge on N.C. 16, just a few hundred yards from Blevins' home.

Hammer said in court yesterday that he is not responsible for those deaths.

"As far as Jimmy Blevins is concerned and Mr. Shatley … I had nothing to do with any of that," he said.

In the hallway after the court session, the sheriff of Ashe County, James Williams, said that Hammer is still the prime suspect in the Blevins case. He said that there is speculation about his role in the Shatley murder, but no evidence that Hammer was involved.

"I'm glad people in Ashe County will not have to worry about Mr. Hammer anymore," Williams said. "We will continue pursuing the Blevins case and the Shatley case with everything we've got."

Hammer had served prison time for killing an off-duty Philadelphia police officer in 1978. He had escaped from prison, been recaptured and had his conviction overturned. One of the reasons he came to live in Ashe County was to be in a place where people wouldn't know his past, he said in a past interview.

He wore leg shackles and had a padlocked chain around his waist yesterday.

He waved to his wife as he was led away.

Officers escorted Hammer's wife from the courthouse. They said she had not known anything about what her husband had done. Hammer said the same thing in court.

Officers with assault rifles stood guard as Hammer was loaded into a jail van. He was to be transported to Richmond for processing, then sent to a prison where he will begin serving life without the possibility of parole.


http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/may/23/hammer-admits-killings-gets-7-life-sentences/


First this case and then my brother's case shorty after. I'm no longer waiting for justice.

[YankeeMary]

Your mommy looks like she is such a sweetie.

I, too, am sorry that your family and other families have had to live through all of this. HUGS!!!

[Char]

The entire case is a damn shame... but YIPPIE and YAY... the dirtbag is toast.

[LunaChick]

Thanks guys. I'm just glad the other families didn't have to go through a trial.

[pepperpot]

:hug

[SurferGirl]

Luna I'm so sorry that you and your family had to go through something like that.

[krisharry]

Blessings to you and your family, it sounds like you have been through a lot.