— More than three decades ago, a Halifax County family suffered a double loss. Susan Clary, then eight months pregnant, was found dead in her bed. Since then, her murder and that of her unborn child have remained a mystery.

Maurice Shearin, Clary's mother, remembers how her husband went to check on the mother-to-be.

"He went up there. The back door was open, and he went in and he found her laying on the bed, stark naked with a bra wrapped around her neck," Shearin said.

Investigators say Clary died of asphyxiation, yet the bra around her neck wasn't used to kill her.

"When I got there, they were bringing her out of the house, and her hand fell out from under the cover. And I realized then that she was gone," Shearin said. "You got an emptiness that you can't ever fill."

Clary was 19 years old. The baby she was carrying would be approaching a 31st birthday.

A strange set of circumstances have shrouded the case from the start. Two guns were found in the room, one next to the body, yet neither had been fired. Any fingerprints were wiped clean.

That alone is unusual, according to Major Bruce Temple, of the Halifax Sheriff's Office.



"If somebody spontaneously left those in those awkward positions, you would think that they wouldn't have wiped them clean. They would have just taken them typically," he said.

Clary's husband, Tim, said he left the home while his wife was still asleep. He said that was the last time he saw her alive.

Investigators have eliminated many suspects in the last three decades, but the case remains unsolved.

"We hope that after all these years this case will touch the heart of somebody, and they're going to be inclined to tell us something," Temple said.

Anyone with information about the murder of Susan Shearin Clary in Halifax County can call NC Wanted, toll free, at 1-866-439-2683 to report an anonymous tip.