. (WKYT) – Authorities searched a Danville property Thursday in connection with a 1992 missing person cold case after two people were arrested and charged.
The Boyle County Sheriff’s Department, Emergency Management and public works were on scene at 148 Spring Valley. The address is the same location where a warrant was served in 2016 but nothing was found.
The owner of the property, 76-year-old Barbara Manning, and her son, 59-year-old Anthony Manning, were arrested and charged Wednesday.
Public works arrived with an excavator. Several holes were visible throughout the property where digging had been done. The property is a little more than 5 acres.
An indictment says Anthony Manning is facing charges for murder, tampering with physical evidence and abuse of a corpse. He was previously charged with kidnapping the victim, Anna Manning, and served one month of a six-month sentence.
Barbara Manning is facing charges for complicity to murder, complicity to tampering with physical evidence and complicity to abuse of a corpse.
Barbara and Anthony are mother and son, according to a Boyle County sheriff’s deputy. Anna and Anthony were married.
The indictments say Anna Manning died between Sept. 14, 1992, and Nov. 7, 1992, in Boyle County.
Anthony and Barbara Manning are being held in the Boyle County Detention Center.
Anna Manning’s aunt speaks out
One family member said she believes law enforcement has indicted the right person in Manning’s disappearance.
Elsie Williams, Manning’s aunt, said she has long believed Anthony Manning to be involved in the case.
“I told him to his face it was him,” Williams said. “I said sooner or later or boy they are gonna get you. Cause I’ll never stop until somebody does.”
Williams said her belief comes from information from someone close to Anthony Manning.
“A bunch of the boys was bragging and celebrating something and Anthony was there bragging about it,” Williams said.
Williams said she tried to get that individual to go to authorities but he wouldn’t, citing concern for his life.
“He wouldn’t do it. He was scared to death,” Williams said. “He said they will kill me they will kill me.”
Williams said she is hopeful law enforcement will be able to find her niece’s remains and get justice for Manning.
At 80 years old, Williams said she wants to find Manning sooner rather than later.
“I just want to put her away before I die,” Williams said. “I want to put her away – not let her laying out wherever in God’s name she’s at. Just put her away.”
Local hope is that Manning’s remains are found
Many are crossing their fingers that, unlike ten years ago, Manning’s remains are found.
Crystal Williams was in the area as a child in 1994 and said she has had suspicions about the property for decades, and that she hopes what she knows could point investigators in the right direction.
“They were digging up in here, this is not the right spot, it would be back there on that additional property that they had bought,” she said.
Williams and her dad were picking up scrap from behind this property two years after Manning went missing.
She said that they saw a six-foot pile of dirt and discussed that is where Manning’s remains might be located.
Williams has always been scared of the property.
“When I was writing the witness statement, it took me a week to write it, and it was like being in a Stephen King horror movie, you know,” she said.
Regardless, Williams wants to see justice served.
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