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The mantel at the Poole home on Julian Street has displayed the same family picture for 17 years.

Blown up and pasted on cardboard, it sits behind a dozen baseball trophies, above the nails from stockings of Christmases past.

In the picture, Marilyn Poole smiles as she holds youngest daughter La-Tisha. Her husband, Gattis, and their children surround her.

It's the last family picture that Marilyn could bear to have taken, a moment etched as one of their happier days.

Monday marks 18 years since her 7-year-old daughter Shalonda was slain. Somewhere, a killer marks 18 years on the loose.

Interactive: Video and more about the case

A mirror image

Shanda, 25, sees her twin sister's face every day when she looks in the mirror - Shalonda's eyes, her innocent grin, the face their mama fell in love with.

But 18 years of hell have taken a toll on Shanda's eyes. She's cried for Shalonda. She's cried for the "what-ifs?" Most of all, she's cried for her sister's killer to face justice.

Shanda Kennethea Poole and Shalonda Cynnetha Poole were born 12 minutes apart on Oct. 19, 1982.

From an early age, the twins hated being separated. They dressed alike, matching every detail down to the color of the ribbons in their ponytails.

Shanda was the rowdier of the two; Shalonda, the nurturer. She played mother to the neighborhood children and loved to play house. Shalonda had dreams of having twins of her own one day - she planned to name them Shanda and Shalonda.

As she grew, Shalonda acquired the nickname "Hugs." Her family says she never met anyone she wouldn't welcome with a huge smile.

When the twins fought, which was often, Marilyn would make them hug and make up.

"I would tell them they shouldn't fight like that. You all are sisters," she said. "Shalonda always wanted to hug. She would hug anybody. She wasn't scared of anybody."

Most of all, the twins loved each other. Their mother said they had to be separated in kindergarten so they could learn to play with other children.

After Shalonda's death, Shanda was left to wonder, "Could I have done something different?"

A day never forgotten

Saturday, July 21, 1990, was supposed to be a day of togetherness at the Poole family's home on Ashe Street in the Hampton Homes community.

The children were supposed to spend time with their father, Gattis, who had just been released from jail after serving 30 days on alcohol-related charges.

Early that morning, about 3 or 4 a.m., Marilyn slipped into bed with her husband after completing her shift in the mailroom at the News & Record. They talked for a while, but Gattis had an early morning fishing trip planned with a neighbor.

"He kept telling me not to go to sleep because the kids would be up in a minute and would be ready to eat," Marilyn recalled. Gattis left the house about 6 a.m.

Marilyn dozed off after checking on the kids at 6:30 a.m. About 8:15 a.m., Shanda woke her up and said Shalonda was missing.

In a panic, Marilyn called neighbors and her son Melvin, who lived down the street. No one had seen Shalonda. A neighbor left to get Gattis, who rushed home to join the search.

"He said, 'We are going to find her,'" Marilyn said in a recent interview.

"I said, 'No, we aren't, because she's dead. I can feel that she's dead.'"

By 9 a.m., the police were involved. They took a photograph of Shanda, wearing the same outfit as her missing twin, to distribute to officers and neighbors.

Marilyn said police thought Shalonda would eventually return home, having slipped off to play with a friend or go to the store with a neighbor.

Hours passed as neighbors and police searched. By 7 a.m. Sunday, police Chief Sylvester Daughtry Jr. and about 50 officers were combing the area looking for Shalonda.

They went into the wooded area behind Jones Elementary School, less than a quarter-mile away, and found Shalonda's body in high weeds 20 minutes later.

She had been raped and stabbed to death.

"What I can't get out of my mind is ... that I know during that time she was calling for help, and I know she was calling me," Marilyn said. "But there was nothing I could do to help her.''

The final moments

For the longest time, Shanda carried guilt about her sister's death. She was the last family member to see Shalonda alive.

About 7 a.m. on the day Shalonda disappeared, Shanda woke up to find that her twin wasn't in the bed they shared. She got up to look for her and found Shalonda standing on their back stoop.

Shanda told her sister to come inside because they weren't supposed to leave the house. But Shalonda said no. Shanda went to get some water, and when she came back, Shalonda was gone.

Shanda didn't want to tattle on her twin, so she went back to bed instead of alerting their mother.

Marilyn remembers that Shanda refused to accept that her sister would never be back.

"She knew something was wrong with her ... something was missing, but she couldn't figure out what was happening to her," Marilyn said.

During her teen years, Shanda fell into the wrong crowd and was arrested on charges of drug possession, prostitution and breaking and entering.

Shanda blamed herself and would say, "Well, if I would have stayed ... " Her mother would remind her that her sister's death wasn't her fault.

"If she would have stayed," Marilyn said, "I would have lost two babies."

A suspect is found

Within two days of finding Shalonda's body, police had a suspect in custody.

Melvin Bennett, 32, didn't fit the traditional profile of a rapist and killer, but a neighbor and other witnesses said they saw him walking near the Pooles' backyard that morning.

His arrest shocked the Pooles. "I couldn't believe it," Marilyn said. "He was there when all of my children were born. He would buy them ice cream, take them to the store and watch over them when they played."

Bennett, who is mentally disabled, lived with his grandfather on Florida Street near the Poole home. He had no previous criminal record and rarely missed a day of work at the UNCG cafeteria.

"All of the things he did in his life was a testament that he was a homebody and a hard worker, and not somebody who would be out to commit a crime," said Wally Harrelson, a longtime public defender assigned to Bennett's case.

But on July 23, 1990, police charged Bennett with first-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping and first-degree sexual offense in Shalonda's death.

They said Bennett had confessed to juvenile crimes Detective Candace Lombardo and Ed Hill, a veteran homicide detective.

"He knew things about the homicide that only the murderer would have known," said retired Capt. Larry Payne, who oversaw the case.

The confession became the linchpin of the Guilford County district attorney's case against Bennett. It was also invalid, his defense attorneys still say, because of Bennett's mental condition.

"A psychologist involved in the case said Melvin was very susceptible to suggestion and would say anything anybody wanted him to say," Harrelson said.

Davis North, another public defender on the case, said: "Melvin told us (after hours of questioning) that they finally told him, 'Look, if you just tell us you did it and make it short ... we'll let you go home.'"

Then and now, police and prosecutors deny that anyone forced Bennett's confession.

By the defense's standards, the confession was weak - only a few lines long, with no mention of a murder weapon or how the killing took place.

But it would be enough to put Bennett in jail for almost two years awaiting trial.

DNA turns case on its head

On Sept. 10, 1991, DNA test results shook up everything police thought they knew about the death of Shalonda Poole.

The results showed that semen from the girl's body did not belong to Bennett.

"I couldn't believe it. I just couldn't accept it. I was mad," said Hill, who retired from the department in 1994. "I was never so sure of anything in my life as I was sure that Melvin Bennett was the right man."

The news set off a flurry of pleas by Harrelson and North to have Bennett's case dismissed, including asking for a review by the N.C. Supreme Court. All were denied.

Former District Attorney Jim Kimel contended the results showed only that Bennett didn't act alone, and Kimel made preparations to take him to trial.

Police moved forward with DNA testing on other possible suspects - including Shalonda's father.

The test of Gattis Poole came back negative, as did tests of three other men.

Although the new evidence didn't clear Bennett automatically, it did prompt a judge to finally issue a bond, and he was released from jail in May 1992.

Bennett goes to trial

It took more than two years, but Bennett finally got his day in court on Sept. 28, 1992.

A week before the trial, prosecutors decided to try Bennett on second-degree murder charges, thinking they could get a conviction on the lesser charge, which eliminated the death penalty.

Two years of pent-up grief and anger filled the weeklong trial, which included testimony from Marilyn, Gattis and Shanda Poole, investigators, a psychologist and a DNA expert from the FBI.

But it came down to the confession - which said Bennett acted alone - versus the DNA evidence that showed another man raped the girl.

On Oct. 2, 1992, it took the jury a little more than an hour to reach a verdict: not guilty.

"It was the quickest jury I've ever had in a murder case," North said. "We talked to the jury afterward, and they said it took them 20 minutes for them to get a foreman, and the first vote was not guilty right off the bat."

K.C. Greeson, a High Point woman who served as the jury foreman, said after the verdict: "The consensus of the jury was that there was reasonable doubt. We felt we just didn't have enough evidence."

The not-guilty verdict came so quickly that Bennett didn't know the trial was over until his lawyers patted him on the back.

In June, Bennett declined to be interviewed about the case.

"That's over and done with," he said. "I don't want to talk about that anymore."

Since police and prosecutors felt they had taken Shalonda's killer to court, the investigation came to a standstill.

'All I need is a name'

For the past 10 years, Case No. 900144785 has been Detective Marty Sexton's responsibility.

The veteran detective's job is to find Shalonda's killer. He's interviewed dozens of witnesses about what they remember from nearly two decades ago, and he's dealt with the frustration of countless dead-ends.

"You think you might have something, you get the DNA, and it's not a match," Sexton said. "You realize we have to start again."

But time isn't always the enemy in solving a cold case, Sexton said.

Relationships can change - husbands and wives can divorce, friends can turn on each other - leading to a tip that changes everything.

Technology also is on the detective's side. Each week, DNA from the Poole case is run against nationwide samples collected from anyone convicted of a crime.

In January, the department received a $308,000 grant from the Department of Justice to apply to cold cases.

For Sexton, that means there is hope.

"When you get something like this ... and you see how she was brutalized and treated worse than any animal I've ever seen, it's something that stays with you," Sexton said.

Until the case is solved, his hunt for Shalonda's killer continues.

"All I need is a name, as silly as that sounds," Sexton said. "If you can give me a name, I can handle the rest."

A family learns to heal

Marilyn Poole remains convinced that her daughter's killer was someone close to the family. From an early age, her children knew to stay away from strangers.

"It had to be ... someone my kids are comfortable with,'' she said, "because they would think, 'If my mama knows them, it's all right because they've already been to my house.'"

Marilyn has her list of suspects, but it doesn't include Melvin Bennett. In her heart, she believes she knows who is responsible.

"I just want to know why he did it," she said. "He needs to confess."

The Poole family was torn apart by the tragedy. Each happy memory shared by Shalonda's eight brothers and sisters usually starts with a smile but ends in tears.

"She is still on my mind now no matter where I am at," said La-Tisha Poole, Shalonda's younger sister. "She always pops up in my head. I just look at her picture and wonder how anybody could do that. She was so precious."

After Shalonda's death, the Poole children went to counseling. Their father turned to heavy drinking and lashed out in anger. Their mother worked as many as four jobs at a time - her way of easing the pain. She had to stop when she had a nervous breakdown.

Twin Shanda suffered from years of drug abuse and spent time at a mental hospital.

"I kept in trouble," Shanda said, adding that she's turned her life around in recent years and rejoined her family. "I just want her to know I love her. I'm still here, and I would have done anything for her."

Family members say they cling to Shalonda's memory every day.

On Tuesday, that memory grew even more precious when sister Janeen gave birth to a 6-pound baby girl.

Her name is Shalonda Cynnetha Tarilyn Poole.

"I cried when she was born," Marilyn said. "It was like I was holding Shalonda all over again. It means so much to have her in the family."

Contact Ryan Seals at 373-7077 or ryan.seals@news-record.com