May 25, 1968 Satan let his presence be known in Lebanon, Pennsylvania.
14-year-old Margaret "Peggy" Lynn Reber met the true face of evil and did not live to tell about it.
Peggy was found dead on her bedroom floor in the wee hours of Sunday May 26, 1968. The teenage girl had been beaten, strangled with a cloth dress belt, and mutilated with a 5-foot archery bow in an apartment stripped of electricity.
The shocked citizens of Lebanon Valley stood in the eye of the hurricane as a massive manhunt went underway to find the monster that killed young Peggy.
Peggy lived in a small apartment with her divorced mother, Mary Alice Reber. Mary had a reputation for entertaining her male friends in the apartment she shared with her daughter, and that generated a great amount of attention and suspicion. Investigators were challenged by the amount of traffic the apartment hosted on a routine basis.
The owner of the apartment building, a local attorney, was attempting to evict the single mom and teen at the time of the crime due to delinquent rent. His efforts to evict the Rebers included disconnecting the apartment's electricity.
Peggy's mother went out on Friday night and did not return to her apartment until Sunday morning when she found her daughter's lifeless body on her bedroom floor.
Peggy's identical twin moved out of a neighboring apartment in the same building just days before the crime with her husband and new born child.
Lastly, Peggy's married boyfriend was apprehended the day of the crime at Peggy's apartment for delinquent child support payments owed to his estranged wife.
That recipe when observed collectively left the young girl alone and vulnerable, and ultimately dead.
The first few days of the investigation several men known to frequent the Reber apartment were questioned and jailed on various outstanding warrants. Two men questioned took their own lives shortly after the crime though both were cleared by the F.B.I.
Arthur Root JR was one of those men jailed during routine questioning. He was a married man that had an affair with Mary Reber and lived with her and Peggy, for a period of time. He recently returned to his wife and children. Root admitted to making several visits to the Reber apartment that day because he had stolen money from a nearby laundry mat, and Mary Reber was holding the money for him. Of course Mary was no where to be found at that time, and in his frustration he removed her stereo from her apartment by means of the fire escape as security toward the stolen money. During another visit to the apartment that day he admitted to seeing Peggy at about 6 PM when he knocked on the apartment door. He said Peggy was crying because she didn't know where her mother was, and she was packing in preparation of their pending move.
Art Root JR remained in jail 6 months on unrelated charges before he was arrested for the murder of Peggy Reber.
February 1970 Arthur Root JR was put on trial for the murder of Margaret "Peggy" Reber. The jury quickly found him not guilty of the crime.
Almost forty years after the fact there are those that will argue that a guilty man got away with murder that day, and in that same breath they hint that there was more than one party involved in the crime. Well, if more than one party was involved in the murder of Peggy Reber, why was only one man put on trial?
Art Root JR is not the issue by any means, rather a child was brutally murdered and the crime remains unsolved. WHY?
The investigation of Peggy's murder was huge and so many men were questioned. Hair samples, and dental impressions were taken into evidence because Peggy's body had visible teeth marks and unidentified hairs on her person.
Several men that frequented the apartment along with Root, and Peggy's jailed boyfriend provided dental impressions in the course of the investigation. It looked very thorough to anyone standing in the eye of that hurricane, but hindsight is not so kind.
Common sense would demand that each male that held a key to that apartment provide hair samples and dental impressions simply for elimination purposes, but that was not the case. Three men reportedly held a key to the apartment in addition to Peggy, her twin, and her mother. All reports list Root, Peggy's boyfriend Ray, and her brother-in-law as the males possessing keys to the dwelling. If one really thinks about it that is not correct. The landlord had a key as well. He is never included in the list of those in possession of a key, but one need not be a police detective for that to be a reasonable assumption.
Root, and Peggy's boyfriend, Ray, are the only men that had keys that were subjected to such forensic scrutiny as hair, fiber, and dental impressions. FOUR men obviously have keys to the apartment, but only TWO of those men are under the scope of the massive manhunt? News reports tell of hundreds of men being questioned, yet this small issue just slides by without question.
If one were to apply a bit of effort into researching news reports for 1968 one would find an element of violence within the youthful victim's arena of life. That didn't receive much consideration either. Tapping into a bit of common sense yet again, one would never want to rule out any type of violent behavior by anyone close to a victim of such a violent crime.
Art Root JR had no history of violence.
NUGGET OF NONSENSE
While charged as one of the most horrifying killers in Lebanon's history and awaiting trial for Peggy's murder Art Root JR was allowed to leave jail to attend his own teenage brother's funeral. The lad drowned while swimming in a local damn. If authorities were so convinced of Root's guilt, and knowing the horrific nature of the crime against Peggy, how did they justify such a compassionate act?
A suicide attempt usually results in hospital observation for a few days to several days depending on the situation. Even in 1968 it was not the norm for an emergency room to treat an attempted suicide and simply release the individual. Peggy's twin attempted suicide within hours of learning of her sister's death. Peggy's twin was treated at the local hospital and released. It's not important if her motive was grief, or fear, but she obviously deserved, and needed, more care than a stomach pump and a lollipop. That young lady cried out for help, and even an attempt to take her life got her a quick discharge from the hospital, and tossed her back to the reality she obviously tried to escape. No, other suicide attempts at that same hospital were not handled the same way. One can only trust that detectives believed she was a distraught teen. Those looking back objectively can see the surviving twin was screaming out for help.
Lebanon was so disgusted by the free spirited life style of Mary Alice Reber that they held her responsible for the murder of her child. Mary Alice was breaking all the rules at the time, and her actions compromised her daughters well-being, yet Mary Alice Reber did not kill her daughter.
According to a jury Art Root Jr didn't kill Peggy Reber either, so who did?
There was the slightest mention that in the February 1968 court session a man was charged with ravishing both twins. That would make an obvious starting point for a person of interest, but it quietly escapes attention. The complaint went before the court in February 1968's court session, thus the crime took place prior to that. Art Root JR did not return to the Lebanon area until after that court session, so he was not the unidentified accused in that case. Peggy did not start dating her boyfriend until after that court session as well, so he is not the unidentified accused either. The complaint carried a charge of "ravishing", and while the charge failed to deliver a conviction, Peggy's 14-year-old twin was in the second trimester of pregnancy at the time those charges were dropped. It is amazing that any male over the age of 18 accused of such a crime was spared conviction with a 14-year-old victim so far along in a pregnancy.
What ever were the prosecutor, judge, and child protective services thinking as these charges faded away?
Again, during the investigation and volumes of news reports this point of interest gets less attention than the victim's mother's wardrobe. It was more important to know details of Mary Reber's poor housekeeping, her questionable life-style, and her wardrobe, than to address the actions of at least one man toward the twins prior to the murder.
Peggy's 18-year-old boyfriend was apprehended early on the day of the crime, at the Reber apartment, by a constable. Ray was behind in child support owed to his estranged wife, and he was jailed for the remainder of the weekend. It was a Saturday afternoon and the apartment was not the legal address for the young man, yet the constable knew where to find him that day. Did someone whisper in the constable's ear as to where to find Peggy's boyfriend that day? Did someone put the wheels in motion to make sure Peggy was alone that day?
Some suggest the constable was being dutiful and earning some extra money with picking Ray up that day. His efforts on a Saturday and locating Ray at that location would warrant respect if not for a few other points. Art Root JR lived in that same apartment for almost two months prior to the crime, and he also had an outstanding warrant, but that didn't render action on the part of that constable, or any other law enforcement officer. A total of five men questioned in the immediate time following the crime were jailed on outstanding warrants, granted one was Root, and the dedicated constable did not seek those men out in his professional pursuits either. It doesn't really spark too much consideration until two years later when Peggy's boyfriend, Ray, returned to Lebanon, PA to testify at the murder trial of Art Root JR. The same constable illegally jailed Ray for five days once again. A judge had to order a release of the young man. No longer is the constable the dedicated professional just doing his job.
No, none of that identifies a killer, but it illustrates just one of the oddities on the fringe of this case.
Peggy was found dead in an orange dress that she made in a home economics class in school. News reports mention Peggy's twin was wearing that same dress during an altercation earlier that week. The dress was torn when her sister was wearing it. It is a fact that Peggy was found in that dress, yet her boyfriend Ray said that was not what she was wearing when the constable apprehended him at the apartment that day. Ray was picked up early that afternoon so perhaps Peggy changed clothes. However, a friend of Peggy's recalls even after 39 years that Peggy was not wearing that orange dress as of 8 PM that evening. Oh, several people claim to have seen Peggy that day in that dress. Did they? Really? Or did they see her in passing that day, read about the discovery of her body, and trust that dress is what they saw her wearing? Does it matter? Ask her killer because only he knows for sure.
Investigators mention numerous times that the crime suggests multiple killers. The archery bow was thrust into Peggy's body at least 10 times, and left 5 holes in her heart. Some people believe that one person held her down as a second party attacked her. STILL, Art Root JR was the only person ever charged with the crime. Where is the second player?
Naturally, a review of court testimony by the experts would greatly assist in putting that second party on trial, but that is wishful thinking. Art Root JR was found not guilty and the prosecution did not request a full transcript of the trial from the court reporter. There is no detailed trial transcript.
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Background from Google search result
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