OPINION|
Sheri Hays thought a few minutes under a hot shower would help with her migraine.
Hays, 60, lives on 32 acres of land west of Billings. She owns and operates a wedding venue, a refurbished barn on her property.
Thursday, Oct. 5, was rainy. Like most days, Hays entered and exited the house countless times through sliding doors in the back of the house. She never locked them.
The shower is blocked in glass, near the bathroom door. Her partner, Bill Mace, who lives here with her, was not home.
Suddenly, a man Hays didn't recognize stood on the other side of the glass shower.
“Get out! Get out!” she screamed.
“It was terrifying,” she tells me. “His head was down but he was looking up at me. His hands were clenched and he was growling.”
‘I might have brought him a sandwich'
Nine months prior, Hays and Mace had asked George Beltz to do some work on the outbuildings.
Beltz, 62, is a trusted friend who does maintenance work for Mace, who has many rental properties.
Beltz brought someone with him — a worker named Gary Eugene Edwards. Beltz had known Edwards for years. The two would drive directly to the back of Hays' property via a service road.
Hays knew Beltz, but did not know Edwards.
“I might have said to him something like, ‘Can I get you something to drink?'” she says. “I might have brought him a sandwich.”
No, he wasn't talking on phone; he was talking to himself
On Saturday, Sept. 23, Hays noticed a pickup truck near the outbuildings behind her house.
She phoned Mace to ask if he had sent anyone over to work on something.
She described the truck to Mace, who told her it might belong to Gary Eugene Edwards, the man who had worked at the house months earlier with George Beltz.
Mace told Hays that Edwards must have mistakenly gone to the wrong house. Edwards should have gone to one of the rental properties, instead.
Hays left the house to talk to Edwards. Mace was still on the phone with her. She hesitated, because Edwards' head was down and he appeared to be talking on his phone. She decided to wait.
But she then realized there was no phone; he was talking to himself.
She handed Edwards her phone, so Edwards could talk to Mace.
Edwards told him, “I was told to come here.”
Mace (over the phone) told Edwards no, he wasn't, and he should leave.
Edwards turned his truck around as if he were leaving, but he didn't leave. He sat there in the truck, which was filled with tools.
Hays repeated the message: “Gary, I think you need to go.”
“Not once did he ever make eye contact,” she said.
Edwards left, but hours later returned. Mace was now home. Mace approached Edwards and asked why he was there.
Edwards responded, pointing at one of their dogs.
“Where do you get a dog like this? I have a friend whose dog died. I was thinking of getting him a dog like that.”
Edwards asked Mace for gas money. Mace gave him $40 and Edwards left.
She knew the face but couldn't recall name
All Hays had in the shower with her was a bottle of soap or shampoo. She chose to attack Edwards with it.
She quickly left the shower and swung the bottle at his head. He backed up just enough for her to slam the bathroom door and lock it. She leaned her weight against the door; she is 5-foot-2 and 120 pounds.
Fortunately, her cell phone was in the bathroom. She first called Mace, not 9-1-1.
“I wanted to call someone who knew the name because I thought he was going to kill me,” Hays explained.
They both then called 9-1-1. The home is in Christian County. A sheriff's deputy was dispatched.
Hays stayed in the bathroom on the phone with the 9-1-1 dispatcher. She could hear Edwards walking about the house.
“I told 9-1-1 he was yelling and I was asked what he was saying,” Hays said. “I said I didn't think he was saying anything. There were no words. He was yelling. He was wailing.”
Several times, Edwards reportedly circled back to the bathroom door. Hays, on the other side, felt him lean into it.
3 days later, he drives onto airport runway
Edwards was arrested at the Hays/Mace home Oct. 5. He has been charged with trespassing, a class B misdemeanor under Missouri law. He was out of the Christian County Jail the next day.
Three days later — Sunday, Oct. 8 — Edwards was spotted in a parking lot at the Springfield-Branson National Airport. The initial report was that he was walking around his pickup with something in his hand, what at least one witness believed to be a machete.
Edwards allegedly drove his truck through and smashed a security security gate and then drove onto one of the airport runways. An airport police officer with lights and siren activated followed the pickup truck, according to court documents. Edwards drove back out through the damaged gate and into a parking lot.
From there, he drove over several curbs, through the parking lot and exited the parking lots near the airport terminal entrance. He ran inside the terminal, where he was arrested. No one was hurt.
Edwards also faces a federal property damage charge for damaging the airport gate. The damage is estimated to cost more than $30,000 to fix.
The state charges are property damage in the first degree and resisting/interfering with an arrest for a felony — both class E felonies. Edwards also is charged with trespassing in the first degree which, as mentioned, is a class B misdemeanor, the same charge he faces for entering Hays' home near Billings and terrifying her.
Disappointed by county prosecutor
Hays tells me she is disappointed the Christian County Prosecuting Attorney's Office has filed only a trespass charge for an event that traumatized her.
“Christian County is acting like I was this hysterical woman,” she says.
The assistant prosecuting attorney handling the case, Hays says, told her it's because Edwards' intentions when he entered her house are unclear.
I called the office and was directed to Christian County Prosecuting Attorney Kristen M. Tuohy, who did not respond by deadline.
When I met with Hays at her home Tuesday, I had to enter a security code to open the gate at the threshold of the long driveway.
She says the gate was never closed until the day Edwards entered through the back of the house.
“It has completely changed my life,” she tells me. “I can not have my 15-year-old granddaughter out here with her friends.”
Several times daily, Hays reviews the list of Greene County Jail inmates to make sure Edwards remains locked up.
She only showers when Mace is home. She has rearranged her furniture.
“I can't sit with my back to that door any more.”
She tells me several people in law enforcement have advised her that if Edwards hears voices telling him to go to her house, he likely will return if those voices continue.
She has changed her views on owning a gun
I ask her if she had a gun in the house the day Edwards intruded.
She did, she says, but neither she nor Mace have ever fired it. They wouldn't know where the bullets are, she adds.
“I have always been anti-gun,” Hays said. “My opinion has changed.”
Her daughter and son-in-law gave her a new gun last week.
Checkered past in Iowa
According to public records, Edwards had been in and out of prison in Iowa eight times since 2002.
He has a long list of arrests in Iowa, including charges of theft, domestic assault, stalking, violation of parole, harassment of a public official or employee, causing bodily injury, possession of a controlled substance, being a fugitive from justice and driving violations that include driving with a suspended license, reckless driving and driving with an open container.
“I know his record looks bad,” says Beltz, who has hired Edwards for jobs, “but he'd never intentionally hurt someone.”
Beltz tells me that Edwards went to prison in Iowa for hitting a man in the head with a hammer, but Beltz feels Edwards was justified because the man he hit was a child molester.
Beltz says Edwards has at least one ex-wife.
Regarding the domestic assault charges...
“The one that I know of was meaner than Louisiana hot sauce,” Beltz said. “She would come at him and all he did was push her away, and she fell down and next thing you know, he's in jail for domestic assault.”
And the theft ...
“There's a time when he stole a four-wheeler, well, it was his four wheeler to begin with,” Beltz said.
One possible explanation is alcoholism
The two men, Beltz and Edwards met in Iowa. Beltz says after he moved to Springfield, he created a concrete company and Edwards was his right-hand man.
“Here lately, I've seen him when he's hearing voices,” Beltz said. “I'm not doubting that he's hearing voices. I just tried to tell him you need to just ignore them, because every time he hears voices, it turns into a catastrophe.
“He heard voices to go out to Bill and Sheri ‘s and that they were in trouble or something.”
One possible explanation for Edwards erratic behavior is alcoholism, Beltz says.
“He would wake up in the morning and open a beer,” Beltz said. “And all day long he would drink beer. And he never got drunk because he was that tolerant of it.”
Beltz talked to Edwards on the phone in jail this week. Beltz said he sounds much better.
“There's a good man in there somewhere,” Beltz says. “I've seen it. He's got a big heart. And he would help anybody.
“He doesn't need to go to prison. He needs help. He really does. He needs professional psychiatric help.”
This is Pokin Around column No. 140.
