Ross County Sheriff George Lavender said Jason McCrary is the prime suspect in the death of 38-year-old Timberly Claytor.
Claytor is the third woman from the area found dead over the last year and is one of seven women who have gone missing during that time period.
Investigators say they are forming a taskforce with federal, state and local officials to solve this killing and find out what happened to the missing women.
The sheriff, chief of Chillicothe police, and county prosecutor were asked if there is a serial killer in the area, and they said they are looking at that possibility.
“That is a possibility we have not ruled out. We do not want to jump to that conclusion because it is possible some or all of these missing persons are independent of one another,” said Matthew Schmidt, Ross County Prosecutor.
McCrary is being held on an unrelated failure to register as a Tier 1 sex offender after he was arrested Saturday near where Claytor body was found in Massieville.
Even with that arrest investigators said the taskforce will look for any connections between the missing and dead women.
Summer Secrest has known Claytor since she was a toddler. She says Claytor was the closest thing to a mom she ever knew.
“It is so unreal, it has not hit home that she is really gone but, I know she is and I just want justice for her and I want justice for all these girls,” said Secrest, Claytor’s close friend.
She says Claytor knew all the missing women and showed kindness to the suspects.
“There was a bunch of them she let live with her. Never charged them any rent, they lived there for free and all of the sudden it has come out that they are suspects,” Secrest said.
Investigators would not confirm or deny the women knew each other and McCrary. Chillicothe police were handling the missing women cases.
“I decided it is time to amp this up we need to find these missing women. So I’ve assigned to detectives to the taskforce and those two have all three missing girls cases right now,” said Chief Keith Washburn, Chillicothe police.
Those missing women are Charlotte Trego, Tiffany Sayre and Wanda Lemons. Tameka Lynch’s parents were at the press conference and want to know how she died. She is one of the three women who died in Ross County in the last year, and was found on a sandbar in Paint Creek.
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