Gwinnett County Sheriff Butch Conway believes his department is “very close” to making multiple arrests in the case of missing teen Justin Gaines, who disappeared from a Duluth nightclub nearly eight years ago.
On Wednesday, Conway’s agency and several others were on their third day of searching property near the Walton-Oconee County line, where a person of interest in the case suggested Gaines’ body was dumped in a well following his November 2007 disappearance. The person of interest is a Walton County inmate.
The search ended around 5 p.m. Wednesday and no remains were found.
“We’ve just not had enough in the past to make a case,” Conway told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, “but I think we’re very close now to charging some people.”
On the night of Nov. 1, 2007, Gaines — an 18-year-old freshman at the Oconee campus of Gainesville State College — left his family’s Snellville home to meet up with friends at Wild Bill’s in Duluth.
Gaines reportedly made several calls to friends while looking for a ride home that night, but no one was able to pick him up. Surveillance footage shows him leaving the club about 1:30 a.m. with a cellphone to his ear, and he was also seen outside the club about an hour later.
He hasn’t been seen or heard from since.
Conway said the person of interest who steered authorities to this week’s search site has been known to investigators for “quite some time.” The sheriff said there are several suspects, and that he’s “optimistic” an arrest, or multiple arrests, will be made soon.
He declined to provide a specific timeline, or additional information about the suspects.
The Gwinnett and Walton County sheriff’s offices and the Department of Natural Resources began searching the High Shoals area near the Apalachee River on Monday. They have pumped wells on the property, which includes an old mill. DNR has assisted with sonar and a “remote underwater vehicle camera,” a spokesman said.
Gaines’ mom, Erika Wilson, told The AJC on Wednesday that she “broke down and just cried” when she heard the latest developments in the case. She’s keeping her optimism in check after eight years of empty leads, fruitless searches and no answers, but she also knows Conway isn’t one to mince words or say things he doesn’t mean.
Arrests would be incredible, she said, but more than anything she wants to give her son a proper burial — if he’s not still out there alive somewhere.
“I’m not really sure what I think right now,” Wilson said. “I want answers, I want closure, but I also want my handsome boy to walk back in the door and say, ‘I love you.’”
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