Tuesday, Sept. 30, 1997 | 10:07 a.m.
Samuel and Betty Hayes would like to see the person who killed their daughter 24 years ago answer to the crime before they go to the grave themselves.
Barbara Jean Kirk, 19, was found dead May 3, 1973, in her burning apartment at the Bonanza Gardens Apartments at 2750 E. Bonanza Road.
At the time, her husband was working as an airman at Nellis Air Force Base. Kirk's body was pulled out of her burning apartment about 5:30 a.m. that day. The coroner determined that the cause of death was strangulation, and that she also had been sexually assaulted.
"As far as I know they don't have any idea who did it," said Betty Hayes, Kirk's mother. "I do know they questioned some of the neighbors."
Now, 24 years later, Samuel Hayes, 73, and Betty Hayes, 63, have offered a $10,000 reward leading to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible for their daughter's death.
"We have never gotten over this," Betty Hayes said from the couple's Dresden, Tenn., home. "We will never get over this. We have saved money and I couldn't think of any better way to put it to use except to try and find out who took my daughter's life. I want the person who did it to have to answer to it before we pass away.
"The reward is for what they took from our lives. My daughter was my world. She was a lovely girl."
One clue Betty Hayes said might lead to the suspect was a robbery at a nearby Kentucky Fried Chicken fast-food restaurant where Kirk worked part time.
"She had written her sister and said that Kentucky Fried Chicken had been robbed while she was working," Hayes said. "She did a photo lineup. She picked out one who looked like him."
Kirk's husband, Renzie Lynn Kirk, has since remarried and lives in St. Louis, Mo., where he is a schoolteacher.
"I have never been able to talk to Lynn about this because it hurts too much," Hayes said. "They were childhood sweethearts and married right out of high school."
Metro homicide Sgt. Bill Keeton said, "The family is hoping this sizable reward will stimulate the public's memory of this 24-year-old murder and are urging anyone having knowledge of this crime to come forward."
Anyone with information has been asked to call homicide detectives at 229-3521 or Secret Witness at 385-5555. All contacts are confidential, Keeton said.
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