School & Community News

Remembering Sarah Pryor

Every 5 years Sarah's family and friends begin a letter writing campaign to keep this piece of dirt behind bars. If anyone is willing, letters can be sent to:

Angela McCown, Director and Parole Board
Texas Dept. of Criminal Justice
Victim Services Division

RE: Offender/Prisoner: Whirty, John R.
STATE ID: 014055698 / TDCJ ID 00195269
Placed in Parole Review 4/5/11

Be sure and include the last 3 lines in the heading of your letter. Every letter helps and is truly appreciated.

FACTS
Whirty is convicted of raping and murdering a 14 year-old girl in Texas.
He is sentenced to life in prison with parole. (Under Texas law, parole process is every five years, extended from the original 3 years)
Whirty served 17 years of the life sentence, and was released in 1985 on “ good behavior” and, because the Texas jails were over crowded. He then returns to his birthplace in the Boston, MA area without alerting parole officials (parole violation!).
In August of 1985, sixteen- year-old, Cathy Malcomson is missing from a nearby suburb. Authorities assume she was abducted and murdered. Her remains have never been recovered.
On October 9, 1985, nine-year-old Sarah Pryor is abducted, six weeks after Cathy. Sarah is taking a walking on a beautiful fall afternoon.
On November 9, 1985, a month to the day of Sarah’s abduction, John Whirty attempts to kidnap another girl. She struggles and frees herself before he can push her into the car with a knife in her side.
November 10, 1985, Whirty is arrested and charged with attempted kidnapping as well as parole violation. He becomes the key suspect in the Pryor and Malcomson cases. He has no alibi, and is “missing” from work during the time Sarah was taken.
Whirty is positively identified by two witnesses as being on the path Sarah walked , during the timeframe of her walk.
Whirty serves time in MA for the attempted kidnapping and is returned to Texas to continue serving the life sentence, with a parole hearing every three years.
A skull fragment is found and positively identified (through mitacondrial DNA testing) to be that of Sarah Elizabeth Pryor. She had been murdered and left in the woods, where exposure and animals destroyed all but a bone fragment.
The team of investigators representing Sarah Pryor’s case, including the Middlesex DA and staff, the FBI, The Massachusetts State Police and the Wayland, MA police, believe without doubt that Whirty is responsible for Sarah’s death.
Sarah Elizabeth Pryor was laid to rest on January 13,1998, on what would have been her 22nd birthday.
Family, friends and the communities affected by Sarah’s disappearance and murder live every day with the consequence of Whirty’s violent actions.