MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR MURDERED TEENS BELINDA WORLEY AND BRIAN GLENFELDT; HIALEAH MILANDER AUDITORIUM; FRIENDS CHRIS MASTERS AND ANDREA NEWELL BOTH (SOT).
The Carol City murders were a series of murders that took place predominantly in Carol City, Florida and in and around Miami-Dade County between October 1974 and January 1978. The murders were committed by American mass murderer and serial killer John Errol Ferguson (February 27, 1948 – August 5, 2013)[1] who murdered at least eight people but is believed to have killed up to twelve. He was aided in six of the murders by two accomplices: Marvin Francois (January 18, 1946 – May 29, 1985)[2] and Beauford White (October 29, 1945 – August 28, 1987).[2]
On July 27, 1977, Ferguson, Francois, and White entered a drug house in Carol City where they tied up a total of eight people and shot all of them in the head execution-style. Only two of the eight survived. At the time, the incident was the largest case of mass murder in Miami-Dade County history. Months after the massacre, Ferguson murdered a teenage couple in Hialeah after raping the female victim. He is also suspected to be responsible for the May 1977 murders of an elderly couple and is suspected of killing a further two men in 1974.[3]
Ferguson, Francois, and White were all eventually captured, sentenced to death, and executed by the state of Florida. Francois was executed in the electric chair on May 29, 1985, followed by White, who was executed in the electric chair on August 28, 1987. Ferguson was executed over two decades later by lethal injection on August 5, 2013, following years of appeals over his sanity.[4][5]
On January 8, 1978, 17-year-old Brian Glenfeldt and 17-year-old Belinda Worley, a couple, left a Youth-for-Christ meeting in Hialeah. They were meant to meet up with friends at an ice cream parlor, however, they never showed up. Instead, the two had gone for ice cream at Farrell's Ice Cream Parlor, located at Hialeah's Westland Mall. They then left and parked at a field known as a popular lovers' lane. Ferguson then approached them, posing as a police officer, intending to rob the couple. He fatally shot Glenfeldt behind the wheel of his mother's car, before taking Worley into the nearby woods where he raped and murdered her.[3][14]
At 2:00 a.m. the families of Glenfeldt and Worley filed missing person reports for both of them. The following morning, Worley's body was discovered under an Australian pine tree in a wooded area. A quarter-mile away, Glenfeldt's body was also located. He had a bullet in his head and was still slumped over behind the wheel of his mother's car. It was determined the shot to the head had killed him, but he had also been shot in the chest and arm. All of Worley's clothes, apart from her jeans, were next to her body. She had been killed by a shot to the back of the head. An autopsy later revealed that she had been raped. Jewelry had been stolen from her body and cash in Glenfeldt's wallet had also been taken.[3][14]
On April 5, 1978, Ferguson was finally captured after the FBI received a tip that he was at an apartment. FBI agents arrived to take him into custody, but Ferguson refused to open the door. Afterward, the agents kicked it down and cornered Ferguson in the living room, where he was wielding a handgun and pointing it at the ceiling. He told them not to shoot him. Ferguson was then arrested and taken into custody.
