Who would dig up a 100 year old boys grave ? Plus Human Bones found under an old Butler Hospital floor? 2 strange goings on in Butler county

Why in deed would anyone dig up the grave of a boy who died 100 years ago .In one of the strangest cases around some one digs up a grave of a boy killed by a train nearly 100 years ago .


Could it be dark witchcraft or satanists at work?Possibly they found something in grave they needed for a ceremony ?  
Who knows very strange in deed Some one looking for treasure? well what ever it was that caused them to dig it up we will probably never know .
Then around same time this happened under the wooden  floors of the Old Butler Memorial Hospital which was turned into apartments and is visible at the towns entrance as you go over the bridge on Pa Route  8  they have found what appears to be human bones as well which there has not been anything in news with either of these incidents in last 3 years since they happened.
Old yellow brick butler hospital on right along hill side 
Butler County has many more mystery's as well including all types of disappearances and unsolved murders more than any other county in Western Pa.
Tales of bodies being dumped in old coal mine shafts and alien UFO and big foot Activity yes you have it all in Butler County which I will be discussing in upcoming articles. 

Beloved Beer Merchants Murder still unsolved after almost 10 years

I ride by the place at the intersection of Lowries Run Road & Rochester Road all the time I do not drink adult beverages so I have never been in there but those who  I know  have always said Joe was the greatest when it came to knowing his customers and taking care of them . That was till one  cold October night in 2006 when they found Joe laying out in his parking lot shot dead by unknown assailants
A possible robbery  gone wrong the full details have never been released  other than it happened late in the evening .
Was it some one he knew ? was it an argument over something ? possible was it transients traveling thru the area  taking advantage of a store sitting back in from road the way it does? very possible with I -279  a mile away but either scenario is possible and still a very cold case with no leads and no video Joe did not have a camera system either a big mistake and sitting back from the road and lighting not very good was an open invitation to trouble even in relatively quiet Ross Twp.
but it is not that quiet the Ross Park Mall and business around it  on McKnight Road also known as  Truck -US-19 have attracted the wrong elements from the North Side and North View Heights Projects  of Pittsburgh to travel out and cause problems and its just as likely it could have been some one from there . 
But so far all leads have panned out. 
I hope they find and bring Joes killer to justice some day but that day is likely to be a long time away.

Armored Courier looses its load of money and creates a massive search for money taken from scene

A colorful alarm dealer I knew who owned an alarm company which provided services to banks   often came into same 2 alarm supply houses I use for buying parts from  and he was always fascinating guy to talk to. Self made and hard working he built a small empire servicing the smaller independent banks around Western Pa. along with owning several other small business. But he recently passed  a shock to us all who knew him.
Unfortunately in the weeks leading up to his passing one of his company's  Fidelity Courier Service  had the back doors of one of there vans fall open along Pa. 19 in Upper St. Clair near a small office park and money go everywhere. people stopped some took a handful and took off to be captured and arrested  later and and some stopped and helped gather it up before police arrived. only $400.00 recovered .
However 2 young men in a small white pickup scooped up one of the bags with thousands of dollars and fled the scene and Local police and FBI has been trying to track them down since .


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/01/bank-courier-van-loses-ba_0_n_1122389.html

Now this behavior of people to do this came as a shock to many as Upper St. Clair and community's surrounding it  is a very influential area you would not expect those traveling in this area to do such things but it did. People no matter there stature in life seem to act like ignorant pigs when given the opportunity.

You would think with all the technology and resources of FBI those 2 men would have been found out by now especially if all of sudden two guys show up in new cars etc.  or all of a sudden are big spenders at the casino but this does not appear to be the case there either sitting on it waiting for statute of limitations to run or there spending it a little at a time.
Now with all the cameras along that stretch of road you think something would have caught them or some one would have squealed on them but its been almost 4 years and nothing and in another 2 years the statues will be run and the colorful alarm company guy I knew will never of had the satisfaction of getting the money back after all the criticism his company received for not doing a better job securing the money in the van.


Still unsolved after 30 +years 2.3 Million Dollar Purolater Armored headquarters Robbery

When I worked for the now closed holmes protection in 1980 some evenings  whenI was not on road handling call I would be in central office in the old 6th street garage where Mellon Center is now located   I would get a call from a Guard at the Purolator Headquarters in Brentwood/ Carrick area to verify all alarms armed and set.
After I left holmes and there terribly run alarm company never thought about Purolater again but in March of 1982 when the place was closing up and a single guard was on duty  2 men would come in and say they where FBI and when the single guard let down his guard they grabbed and bound him and made off with 2.3 million dollars in untraceable cash.
To this day it is unsolved though a couple of names have come up over the years said to be involved but at this point the statute of limitations has long run and no one will be prosecuted because there was no violence involved.


When the crime happened I immediately called the FBI these criminals had to be working on inside information  and told them to make sure they look into all the guys working at holmes as we all knew only one guard was on when they closed  I do not know if they ever looked into it and never received a follow up call.
So if they ever checked the lead out I do not know. 
But who ever pulled it off definitely had inside info as almost no one  who lived in Carrick and Brentwood  even knew the place existed in a back alley behind Brownsville Road  there is just a garage door and no signage and no indication the place even exists it looks like every other back alley door along the alley.
So if it was not some one from Purolator involved it had to be some one who provided service or who even built and or repaired or cleaned the place or people who lived or worked in rest of the building upstairs.
Many leads to check out and chase but apparently none that lead any where.  Who ever these two men are and who ever helped them has never been discovered and remember this was a time when all the mills where going down and people where desperate so a little information could be easily bought  and loose tongues in bars of laid off employees from places did not help.  




Well executed and planned Bank Robbery in Burgettstown was like a made for TV movie still unsolved to this day

If you ever saw the  Clint Eastwood movie Thunderbolt & Light Foot
it is about  a group  of criminals planing and executing a big bank robbery  by way of a home invasion to tie up the bank president so he can not notify police and distracting and then tieing up the guy monitoring the alarms at a central monitoring station as well.

Well a very similar plot played on in spring of 1986 in Burgettstown. except with an interesting twist.

An elderly couple who happen to monitor panic buttons etc for the Mellon bank in their home also happen to be the radio dispatchers for the Burgettstown  and several other small town Police  are invaded and tied up and then the Mellon bank in Burgettstown is sacked and thieves and money is gone never to be traced a total cold case. In what the time was a very rural area till it started being developed in 90's.

So the question who pulled it off obliviously some one had to know the couple where doing the monitoring 
so was it a town resident involved? or town resident who may have been arrested and talked about how easy the pickings would be while in prison? 
How about the people who serviced the radios or the alarms ? Or could it even have been a well organised nationally travelling ring of criminals who looked for these opportunity's ?

Of course the first question is why where this elderly couple doing dispatching and monitoring alarms in there home in the first place?
Well before massive UL Listed Central Stations with fortifications and security systems in place where popular many unusual places served and still serve  as monitoring points including Telephone  Answering Services and even Gas Stations  out west .
 Most very soft targets and criminals knew it and took advantage of it and these crimes where carefully kept from the press and TV  when they where attacked. When I first was involved with alarms and had other dealers monitoring my accounts I thought they had hardened facility's they did not they where using answering services with no protection needless to say I found out  how easy it was to just walk in and take a place over and now use a very good UL listed service 
Today attacking a Central station is futile with back up systems in place and fully supervised communications and alternative central station set  ups at the flip of a switch . But there are still plenty of the small soft targets out there if you know where to look. But criminals have gotten much more sophisticated when it comes to eluding capture and why risk getting your plan blown when dealing with 2 sites when you can hit one be on an interstate in 5 minutes and be gone. 
Some one some where knows what went on in Burgettsown that day and some one may eventually pay for the crime but the clock is ticking away.






Unsolved industrial Park Arson in Turtle Creek was it part of plan to get rich when Mon Valley Expressway came thru?

It was 1995 and there where two visions one a family's quest to to turn a former Copper Mill in Turtle Creek into a small viable industrial park the other the Pa. Turnpike Commission  completing of the Mon Valley Expressway both seen  as a means to create and keep jobs in a valley decimated when Westinghouse and steel mills closed .
Both dreams dashed one by an Arson Fire  the other by lack of funds  with possibility one may some day be completed.



http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=19950308&id=V-FRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=mW4DAAAAIBAJ&pg=4520,4467536


Remains of old Copper mill



Yes in 1995 the Mon Valley expressway- MVE was in full swing as property was being acquired and cement was being laid in Fayette and Washington county's. the ambitious project to have a continuous toll road from I-68 near Morgantown W.Va. to Pittsburgh thru the Mon Valley  would bring jobs and industry .
Unfortunately  it has only been fully built to Elizabeth just over Allegheny County line  but at the time there was a proposal to extend it from near the Squirrel Hill Tunnels in Pittsburgh I-376  to Penn Hills by way of a spur which would go thru Braddock and up thru East Pittsburgh and Turtle Creek. Yes right thru where the old Westinghouse Copper Mill was located.
MVE Gateway 

 And every where the proposed route was going there where Arson Fires especially in Hazel Wood section of Pittsburgh, plus Braddock and Duquesne and in Duquesne there was also talk of expanding Kennywood with a water park and a new development in Cochratowne section of Duquesne  both of which have not been done .
 Just as soon as it was announced the Turnpike had run out of funds and MVE was on indefinite hold the fires almost all stopped as well.
So you can see why it is so suspicious the fire at the copper mill may well have been something to do with the MVE being built  what better way to run down property values and get property owners to sell quickly and get out of a bad area. Have some shill buyers buy up the property's and then thru a series of  shell company's sell it all at a handsome price  to the turnpike commission .
But all the fire accomplish was destroy a valley and business around it   like in the picture below where a hotel/bar once sat on now vacant lot. the whole neighborhood now a slum when it would have been very viable had the Arson Fire not occurred.
I saw video of the fie during an Arson investigators class taught by the late Larry Boyle and like Larry said some one knows and sooner or later is going to brag about it and some one snitch on them. and hopefully those behind these development by Arson fires all around western Pa. will be held accountable as it goes on all the time .

No such thing as a Coincidence

ARSON VALLEY
OR URBAN REDEVELOPMENT
BY FIRE?
WHO IS THE PROFITEER


There is a valley in the City of Pittsburgh Pa. Which Pa. Route 51 runs thru other wise known as Sawmill Run Blvd. Pa. 51 runs from the Ohio Line near E. Palestine South to Union Town approx 100 miles
But I call it Arson Valley since I was a small child in the 60’s there has been many major arson and suspicious fires all along the approx 10-mile stretch of Pa.51, which runs thru the city
From the West End Bridge to Brentwood Pa. So many fires in such a small area I call it arson valley.
One of the first fires I remember was a Bar at the corner of Edge Brooke Rd. and 51 in the 60’s now a big parking lot. Another big fire was in a very large bar and a restaurant replaced nightclub at Bausmann and 51which
Tambellinis which it self had a fire and was destroyed on southern Ave. which connects to 51 from Warrington Ave.
Southern Ave was also the scene of many bad residential fires 10 family members lost their lives in a fire
And off of Bausmann Ave. runs Knox Ave., which also saw a fire, which claimed a family of 10 including children.
The Motor Cycle business still at its same location 1 block from Bausmann saw a fire, as did the thrift store
Liberty tunnels almost all buildings around tunnel entrance suffered a fire

Directly across from bausmann.
1 block down from Bausmann you have the Liberty tubes and bridge. Businesses on all 4 corners suffered suspicious or arson fires. The happy dragon restaurant and 2 Syrian restaurants. The long abandoned
Lumber yard burned and an arson fire. W. Liberty ave has been the scene of numerous Suspicious and arson fires as well The liberty tube business are all gone having been replaced by a new cloverleaf to eliminate traffic back ups.
Down the road from the tunnels. A hillside full of businesses has also seen fires. Including the old Mays dept store warehouse and Seco Manufacturing now closed. And fires back in a little community called seldom scene because t is totally boxed in. the community no longer exists a now extinct transit project came thru and was never completed.
And starting in the West End there have been numerous arson fires and a fire bombing during the 60’s riots
Going the other direction past Bausmann and Liberty there have again been numerous fires.
The old Country Belle Dairy arson, Ronnie’s Tire a fire destroyed the business possibly electrical in nature which also seems to happen a lot in this valley across from Ronnie’s, Sunset auto destroyed by fire when a car caught fire .All with in a block of the bar which caught fire. Directly beside The old country bell dairy
Sat a big old dive of a bar called the barn again destroyed by arson a convenience store sits in the location.
One time in the late 80’s while driving home from work late at night I saw what looked like a storm sewer on fire in the street directly across from the motorcycle shop that had the fire. I stopped and called the fire dept from a payphone up the street and when they arrived to investigate I showed them which grate and we found remnants of a large beer bottle which had been used as a Molotov cocktail and was apparently meant for a business but as I came up the road my lights must have spooked them.
I never received a follow up, call, which is typical in Pittsburgh.
There have been numerous fires with cars in auto repair garages along 51
One business had 2 fires each time a different owner. And Brentwood has seen its share of fires as well along 51 Versharins a large grocery burned to the ground as well as its old green houses in Mt Oliver, which is located along Bausmann. All along 51 you will find boarded up closed business most owned by a pair of brothers who deliberately keep them slummy and whom Brentwood is always fighting with to clean up businesses move in and out frequently as the owners jack up rates continuously and make no repairs.
But Brentwood as well as no other community along 51 has anywhere near the amount of fires the city of Pittsburgh has had along this particular stretch. Some communities Like McKee’s Rocks and Aliquippa 
Have had a small rash of fires along 51 in fact I know of no other stretch of road with such a deadly legacy of fires aprox.170+ fires over 40 years
So who is responsible? One theory is real estate speculators. 51 is only 2 lanes each direction and needs to be expanded as well the creek running thru the area needs scooped out and covered. Buy the property cheap after a fire has whipped out an owner with no insurance and when the state or transit agency comes thru big profits after waiting 20-30 years.
And with the liberty tubes cloverleaf project some people saw big profits as the cloverleaf was planned in the 30’s but not put into place till the 90’s people knew sooner or later the property would be worth a fortune. It seems like any time you mention highway or other big plans Arson is not faraway
Bad wiring human error OK but almost 60% of the business in the 10-mile long valley having some type of fire impossible.