Straddling the Tennessee border, Oak Grove, a town of approximately 8,000 people, is in Kentucky’s Christian County. In 1994, a double murder occurred at a local business providing services which most people of faith would deem most unchristian.

During the early morning hours of September 20, the bodies of twenty-two-year-old Gloria Ross and eighteen-year-old Candy Belt were discovered in the back of Oak Grove’s New Life Massage Parlor. In addition to having their throats slashed, both women had been shot execution style.

The parlor’s proprietor ultimately publicly acknowledged Oak Grove’s open secret; her business was a place of ill-repute and the purported masseuses were prostitutes. What she next contended made Oak Grove seem like the southern Peyton Place.

The local police, she claimed, were frequent patrons at her parlor, and she accused one of them of murdering the women.

Candy Belt        Gloria Ross

Gloria Ross and Candy Belt were both young mothers struggling to make ends meet. A newlywed and the mother of a young son and six-week-old daughter, Gloria lived in Oak Grove but had been working at the New Life Massage Parlor for only two weeks. Candy lived with her two small sons in Providence, sixty-five miles north of Oak Grove, and was taking business management classes at a local college.

Business was slow on the evening and morning of September 19 and 20. Candy and Gloria were the only employees at the parlor by 3:00 a.m. After several phone calls over the following half-hour went unanswered, Tammy Sneed and Millie Burns, two other employees who had worked that evening, returned to the parlor at roughly 3:35. They had to use force to gain entrance because a rock generally used as a doorstep had been placed against the door on the inside. Upon entry, they found an ashtray knocked over in the lobby and the phone off the hook.

When Tammy and Millie entered the backroom, they found the bloodied bodies of their coworkers. Gloria lay nude on the massage table while Candy was on the floor covered by a camouflage blanket.

When medical personnel and police arrived on the scene, they found both women had been shot in their heads and stabbed in their necks. Gloria was dead; Candy was alive but succumbed three hours after being transported to Nashville’s Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

Autopsies determined both women had been shot with a small-caliber gun, likely a .22, and their throats had been slashed. Coroner Bill Cundiff placed the time of death between 3:00-3:30 a.m., meaning the women could have been attacked while the phone calls were made to the parlor or as little as five minutes before their bodies were found.  Authorities came to suspect they were killed by someone they knew and with whom they felt comfortable letting inside the building because the door showed no sign of forced entry and its inside locks were unlocked when Tammy and Millie forced their way inside.

Considering their line of work, it was not surprising that semen was found in the women’s’vaginas and anal cavities. Fellow working girls, however, did not believe the fluid was from a regular customer because of the parlor’s strict policy requiring all male subjects to wear condoms when receiving services. Their beliefs were bolstered after all of the customers listed on the parlor’s sign-in sheet were cleared of involvement.

Robbery was ruled out as motive for the murders after no money was found to have been taken from the women or the business.

The Madams Are Murdered

Oak Grove’s New Life Fitness and Massage Parlor (some sources say the business was called New Life Massage and Jacuzzi) was located on United States Highway 41 along the Interstate 24 interchange, only half-a-mile from the Fort Campbell Army Base. The parlor catered primarily to the upwards of 25,000-30,000 soldiers generally stationed at the barrack.

Depending on the specific services sought, the charges ranged between $45 and $125, split between the working girls and the owners, Tammy and Ronny Papler, who rented a portion of the building housing a Chinese restaurant behind a cluster of businesses.

The New Life Massage Parlor

The daily operations of the New Life Massage Parlor were handled by Tammy who herself had previously been a prostitute in Nashville. Ronnie was largely a silent partner.

Two months after opening the parlor in 1992, the Paplers and three employees were arrested and charged with promoting prostitution, a crime which is often a felony in Kentucky and punishable with prison time. All, however, received only probation and their brothel was not closed.

Tammy And Ronnie Papler

Tammy Papler believes the sentences were lenient and her business was not shut down because the Fort Campbell soldiers were not the parlor’s only patrons. The clientele also included many prominent local residents including lawyers, doctors . . . and policemen.  Oak Grove officials acknowledge an attempt to close the parlor was bungled after an undercover officer paid $125 for oral sex. 

Papler says city officials and the men in blue used her business to get out of the red. In her words, she was the local City Hall’s “Golden Goose,” purchasing multiple items for the cash-strapped city and police department, including new uniforms, new shoes, and new lights for their police cars.

Oak Grove Mayor Bobby Mace said his town police force had a long-standing policy of accepting private donations because the city lacked the money to buy everything the department needed.

Papler’s Claims

Oak Grove Police Chief Milton Perry confirmed Papler gave him $1,200 which receipts show was deposited into a city account on December 15, 1993. Papler said the amount she gave him was $1500.

Though he thought it a bribe, Chief Perry, on the advice of City Attorney John Chewning, says he accepted the money as a “Christmas present” and planned to use it for equipment purchases. He later admitted, however, that most of the money was spent on a Christmas dinner for his officers and their families.

Milton Perry 

Oak Grove Police Chief

Papler says one police officer in particular took excessive advantage of her parlor’s services.

Hired as an Oak Grove Patrolman and Canine Officer a few months before the murders, twenty-four-year-old Ed Carter was an immediate fixture at the New Life Massage Parlor, and, patrons say, often gave the impression of being in charge. Papler contends that after helping get a competing business closed, Carter began demanding more personal items and more personal favors from the working girls. In addition, while having begun a relationship with a parlor manager, the recently-married Carter demanded Papler contract his wife for janitorial work at the parlor.  Over the following two years, Papler says she paid them nearly $5,000 for only a couple of instances of “cleaning services.”

When Papler returned from a vacation several months before the murders, she found a significant amount of money missing. When told Carter had been going through her books and cash box, she came to believe he was stealing from her and barred him from the parlor.

After also refusing to purchase any more items for the police department, Papler says Carter and several other Oak Grove policemen began threatening her.

Ed Carter 

Oak Grove Police Officer

Carter acknowledged being at the New Life parlor on the evening of September 19. He says he left before midnight for a tryst with an “occasional” lover, a married Fort Campbell soldier, but insisted he had returned home by 3:00 a.m., the approximate time the murders occurred. His wife Carol, however, says he did not come home until shortly after 4:00 at which time, he, oddly, began washing clothes.

Carol also disputes Carter’s claim of not owing a small-caliber gun believed to have been used in the murders. She says he often kept it under his mattress but that it was not there on the morning of the shootings and that she had not seen it since the previous Christmas, nine months earlier.

Six days after the murders, Carol filed a domestic violence complaint against Ed Carter and divorced him shortly afterwards.

Carol Moore

Ed Carter’s Former Wife

On October 5, several days after failing a polygraph test, Carter resigned from the Oak Grove Police Department and secured an attorney who advised him not to answer any further questions on the matter.

Carter Resigns

Several months later, thirty-one-year-old Leslie Duncan also departed the Oak Grove Police Department. As its only detective, he was the lead investigator in the parlor murders, the first homicide investigation he had headed.

Duncan resigned shortly after Major Billy Gloyd of the Christian County Sheriff’s Office and policeman Bob Combs, the first officer on the scene, accused him of having compromised the investigation by allowing multiple unauthorized people, including the Paplers, Officer Carter, and Mayor Mace, inside the parlor where they handled potential evidence before the crime scene was aecured.  Combs also says the parlor phone was off the hook when he arrived, but that he saw a bare-handed Duncan place it back on the receiver without testing for fingerprints.

Papler also says Duncan, a former roommate of Ed Carter’s, was also contracted for supposed janitorial work. Like Carter, he had also performed few cleaning services, but, also like Carter, had frequented the parlor and partook of its services.

Leslie Duncan

Oak Grove Police Department Detective

Later in 1995, approximately one year after the double murder, the New Life Massage Parlor closed after Ronnie and Tammy Papler were again arrested for operating an illegal business. They pled guilty to third-degree promoting prostitution and received two years-probation.

The Paplers then opened Cherry Video, an adult business store. Shortly afterwards, the Oak Grove City Council imposed a $5,000 annual fee on such establishments. An incensed Tammy believed the ordinance was enacted in another attempt to shut her down because the Oak Grove elites were angered at not being provided the same physical and financial favors they had received at the massage parlor.

Papler’s Massage Parlor Is Closed

 And Her New Business Is Essentially Taxed

On July 15, 1997, shortly after her probation ended, Tammy Papler stormed into the City Council and spilled all of her secrets: her previous parlor had been a brothel and multiple police officers and city officials were regular patrons to whom she had paid bribes in exchange for a “hassle-fee existence.” She accused Ed Carter of the murders and his colleagues, chiefly Leslie Duncan, of covering up the crime.

Papler produced copies of canceled checks totaling $4,800 made out to Carter, his former wife, and to Duncan for their supposed cleaning services over the previous two years. Carter’s former wife confirmed they only performed a couple of instances of actual cleaning.

Papler Goes Public

Before securing a seat on the Oak Grove City Council in 1996, twenty-seven-year-old Patty Belew, using the name “Harley,” had worked at the New Life Massage Parlor for two years, quitting only one week before the murders. She had recently married into a prominent local family and her influential in-law’s used their clout to help her win the seat.

Belew confirmed that she and the other young women were really prostitutes, saying she generally made roughly $1500 a week. She confirmed Ed Carter and several friends, along with fellow police officers from nearby Hopkinsville, were regulars at the parlor, often demanding sexual services at little or no cost under the threat of arrest or closing the business. Belew shares Papler’s belief that local police officers were involved in the murders of Candy Belt and Gloria Ross and/or the cover-up.

Patty Belew

Oak Grove  City Councilwoman

Amidst mounting pressure, Belew resigned from the city council one month later. She moved to Tennessee where she and her husband Joe worked transporting mobile homes. She later obtained a real estate license.

Belew Starts Anew

The Kentucky State Police took over the investigation into the Oak Grove Massage Parlor murders in 2006. In July 2012, former lead detective Leslie Duncan, then working as a security guard at a discount store in Hermitage, Tennessee, was charged with evidence tampering after the investigation and additional interviews determined he had discarded shell casings and wiped fingerprints off the lobby phone. Under a plea bargain, he pled guilty, admitting he had mishandled the crime scene in being “in over his head” as a first time lead homicide investigator, but he insisted he had not been an intentionally defective detective.

In November 2013, Duncan was sentenced to three years in prison, but he soon faced the possibility of significantly more time behind bars after being charged with conspiracy to commit murder.

Duncan Is Arrested . . . 

The new charge against Duncan was filed that same month after Ed Carter was charged with the bordello murders.

After resigning from the Oak Grove Police Department, Carter moved to Lynnville, eighty miles west of Oak Grove, where he continued working part-time as a police officer before later relocating to Nashville and then to Louisville, working in airport security. At the time of his arrest, he was living in Ohio.

. . . As Is Carter

Also charged with the murders was forty-year-old Frank Black of Gadsden, Alabama. He had been a customer at the massage parlor, and an acquaintance says he had been with Black and saw him enter the parlor several hours before the women’s bodies were found; he also believes he saw him at the crime scene following the murders.

At the time of the killings, Black was living in Clarksville, Tennessee, thirty-five miles southwest of Oakville, and working at Nashville’s Opryland Hotel. In December 1995, he was convicted of the attempted rape of a hotel guest at knifepoint the evening after the parlor murders fifteen months prior. The fixed-blade knife he used to abduct the woman was similar to the one used to kill Gloria Ross and Candy Belt.

Black was sentenced to seven years in prison and was required to register as a sex offender after his release.

. . . And Frank Black

The trio’s trial began on September 6, 2016, nearly twenty-two years after the murders. Prosecutors sought to show that Ed Carter enlisted Frank Black in murdering Candy Belt and Gloria Ross, and that Leslie Duncan deliberately covered up their involvement by contaminating the crime scene. Their case, however, fell apart from the beginning.

In addition to no physical evidence linking any of the defendants to the crime scene, the semen found on the women was not matched to any of the men. Prosecutors argued it could have come from a customer, but in addition to Tammy Papler’s bullish policy of men wearing condoms, the logbook for that evening showed there were no customers.

It was also found that officers other that Detective Duncan had been derelict in their duties. Many uncontaminated hairs and clothing fibers retrieved by deputies were never submitted for DNA testing, nor was a knife obtained in a follow-up interview.

The prosecution was also unable to establish that Frank Black had any connection with Ed Carter or Leslie Duncan. The acquaintance who said he had seen Black at the parlor several hours before the women’s bodies were found was developmentally disabled, and, the defense showed, had likely been led by investigators into placing Black was at the crime scene.

As the state’s case unraveled, Jude Philip Patton issued a directed verdict dismissing the charges against Leslie Duncan. He had two months remaining on his prison sentence but was given credit for time severed and was released.

Shortly after the trial concluded several on September 14, the jury found Ed Carter and Frank Black not guilty of murder.

Carter, Black, And Duncan Are Acquitted

Many believe Ed Carter got away with murder, but others suspect Gloria Ross’s husband Ryan, a Fort Campbell soldier. The couple fought frequently and Ryan was angry after Gloria’s mother had, shortly before the murders, told him of her daughter’s intentions of leaving him and taking their daughter to live with a friend in Florida.

A private investigator says Ryan tried to hire him to follow his wife as he believed she and Candy were romantically involved. The PI claims Ryan said he would kill his wife if his suspicions of her lesbian affair were confirmed. Ryan denies making the statement or trying to hire the private investigator.

Ryan frequently had Gloria’s key to the New Life Massage Parlor and was seen by a neighbor leaving his trailer near the time when the murders are believed to have occurred. He was interviewed after the murders and, even though he failed a subsequent polygraph test, he was not further questioned or asked to provide a DNA sample.

Another person of interest in the murders is casual customer James Henson, who worked as an appliance distributor in Hopkinsville. The parlor’s records show he first frequented the facility in January 1994, eight months before the murders. His now deceased girlfriend, Teresa Abbott, suspected him of the crime, saying when she last saw him shortly before 10:00 on the evening of September 19, he was carrying a Nike bag containing a knife, a gun, and a pair of gym shorts.  When she next saw him at 9:30 p.m. on September 20, she found it odd that he opted to wash his car by hand; he normally used car washes.

Parlor employees Tammy Sneed and Millie Burns, the last people to see Candy Belt and Gloria Ross and the discoverers of their bodies, recalled a man they did not know sitting in the New Life lobby when they left the parlor on the evening of the 19th. The man declined sexual services and appeared to be wearing a disguise and under the influence of something. His physical features were similar to those of Henson.

I could not find pictures of Ryan Ross or James Henson.

Other Suspects . . .

Ronnie and Tammy Papler, in particular the latter, were also considered suspects. Multiple women who had worked at the massage parlor said Tammy had a hot temper and had threatened to harm those she believed had crossed her. Some have speculated that Gloria Ross and Candy Belt may have done so and paid the ultimate price.

Nothing has been found, however, suggesting the Paplers were involved in her employees’ murders.

. . . Including the Parlor Proprietor

Multiple civil lawsuits have been filed in relation to the Oak Grove bordello murders.

In 1998, a Kentucky federal court granted Ryan Ross a no-fault judgment against Ronnie and Tammy Papler for failure to respond to his lawsuit accusing them of negligence in his wife’s murder. Ross’ negligence claim against Louise Seawright, the owner of the building housing the massage parlor, was dismissed.

In April 2014, six months after Ed Carter, Leslie Duncan, and Frank Black were criminally indicted, Gloria Ross’s son Lerandle and daughter Shanice, along with Candy Belt’s sons Chris and Mychal, filed a suit against Carter, Duncan, and the city of Oak Grove for wrongful death of their mothers. The specific amount of monetary compensations sought was kept private as has the result of the suit.

In September 2017, Ed Carter filed a wrongful incarceration lawsuit against former Kentucky State Police Officer Jason Newby, who led the state investigation into the Oak Grove New Life Massage Parlor murders. Carter alleged the lawman concocted a shoddy investigation and fabricated conclusions in charging him with murder. Newby’s motion to have the lawsuit dismissed was denied, but I have not been able to find the results of the suit.

Ed Carter Files a Civil Suit

Everyone who had worked at the New Life Massage Parlor says Tammy Papler was uber-insistent the male clientele wear rubbers when receiving services. On one occasion, the practice produced a problem for the city.

During one stretch when business was booming, a city crew was called to clean out a congested sewer line, found to have been clogged with condoms coming from the massage parlor.

The Cost Of Safe Sex?

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/254387650/gloria-ann-ross

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/172494818/candida-candy-belt

Sources:

• CNN
• Kentucky New Era
• Leaf-Chronicle (Clarksville, Tennessee)
• Lexington Herald Leader
• Louisville Courier-Journal
• The Messenger (Madisonville, Kentucky)
• The Oxford American
• Unsolved Mysteries
• Washington Post