On Friday’s NBC Dateline, investigator Dennis Murphy will talk about how awful it was that Emory University student Shannon Melendi went missing and was then killed. Melendi was born and raised in Miami, Florida. On March 26, 1994, he was last seen in Atlanta.
Butch Hinton got a life sentence for killing Shannon, but 28 years later, Shannon’s family is still fighting for her.
Before he admitted to the terrible truth in 2005, he beat, killed, and burned the 19-year-old woman in a brutal way.
Before the episode, you can find out some horrible details about what happened to Shannon and how she died.
Dateline looks into the murder of Shannon Melendi, who went missing after a softball game
The scary story of Shannon Melendi, a 19-year-old softball scorekeeper who went missing after a game, will be the focus of an upcoming NBC Dateline show.
The next day, her car was found at a gas station, with the keys still inside. Shannon’s body hasn’t been found yet, and she may never see her family or friends again.
Colvin “Butch” Hinton III is also well-known for killing Shannon Melendi while he was in prison for a crime.
According to WKYC, he was an umpire at the softball game where Melendi was keeping score, but it took ten years for the police to charge him with murder.
Hinton was linked to the case after they got an unidentified call from a phone booth and found Melendi’s rings wrapped in tape inside a bag.
Where is the murderer Butch Hinton now?
Hinton is serving a life sentence at the Hays State Prison in Chattooga County, Georgia. He is now 61 years old.
A news release said that Hinton was eligible for parole under Georgia law seven years after he was sentenced to prison in 2005. But in 2012, the request was denied. He was told he couldn’t get out of jail in 2020, and his next parole hearing won’t be until February 2025.
“God bless and thanks to the parole board. And thanks to everyone who has helped us in this never-ending battle “Melendi’s parents, Yvonne and Luis Melendi, are said to have said at the time, according to WKYC.
Her sister, Monique Melendi, went on to say, “We are so grateful to society for helping us continue to fight for Shannon’s justice.”
Hinton, on the other hand, lost all of his appeals after he was found guilty in 2005. He eventually admitted to the crime and told ABC News that he also raped the woman twice.
Parents and family of Shannon Melendi now
Because Georgia law at the time did not allow for a sentence of life in prison without the chance of parole, Melendi’s family is organizing campaigns and petition drives to put Hinton behind bars for good, the site said.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a U.S. congresswoman, helped Melendi’s family start a petition against Hinton’s release in 2011. According to the Miami Herald, 77,000 people signed the petition.
Shannon Melendi’s father, Luis Melendi, said that he doesn’t believe Hinton killed his daughter, even though he knows that he did.
“He is a more professional criminal than the police are a professional policeman,” he told ABC News. “He killed her and set fire to her body in the yard. The police looked all over the area, but they couldn’t find my daughter. That’s not what I think. As I sit here, I don’t believe that.”