Hannah Gilley's mom: 'Is my little girl dead?'

• Progress, but no arrests
• 'I don't know what to think'
• Still, denial

Andrea Carver bolted up in bed at precisely 3:45 a.m. April 22, sucked in her breath and gripped her chest.

A sound sleeper, Carver couldn't shake the sickening feeling that wouldn't let her rest again. So she put on a pot of coffee and got to her day.

A mother feels things.

The call came about her youngest child, Hannah Hazel Gilley,  just hours later.

The caller simply said there had been an accident involving Hannah and her fiance, Clarence "Frankie" Rhoden. Carver was needed up on Union Hill Road because Pike County's child protection services was going to take the couple's 6-month-old son, her grandson.

She thought of her son-in-law to be, who she knew adored her blue-eyed, blonde-haired 20-year-old daughter and their baby, Ruger Lee Rhoden.

Damn it, Frankie, she thought, you always did drive too fast. It was the only thing she ever worried about concerning him. She was going to give him a piece of her mind when she saw him.

A mother hopes against hope.

But sheriff's squad cars blocked Union Hill Road by the time she and her husband, who worked with Frankie at a local sawmill, got there. She pleaded with them to tell her what was going on. She begged for any information. She was hollering at them and, as the minutes wore on, screaming.

Frantic, she called a friend who made it up the road before it was blocked. Please, please, please tell me if Hannah is OK, she asked.

"I just kept asking: 'What about Hannah Hazel?' " Carver said in an exclusive interview with the Enquirer. "But she didn't want to tell me. She didn't want to.

"Finally, I screamed: 'Is she dead? Is Hannah Hazel dead?

"Is my little girl dead?"

A mother knows things.

Finally came the answer: Yes.

That was the moment Carver went numb.

"I think that is best of all,'' Carver said of her numbness while sitting in a car at her daughter's gravesite.  "That way, I can't feel pain, I can't feel the hurt, I can't feel happy."

Rain pelted down.

"Sometimes, most times, I don't feel nothing at all."

Hannah Gilley, her fiance and six members of his family were killed in the early morning hours of that April day. All were shot, several as they slept in three trailers and a camper on Rhoden family land. Carver said Hannah was shot five times in the head. When she closes her eyes, that is what she sees: Hannah's beautiful long blonde hair matted in blood.

She hopes Hannah slept as her killer pulled the trigger, but as a young mother who slept lightly, she fears she was startled awake.

In the six months since, more than 100 investigators have combed the crime scenes for evidence, interviewed hundreds of family members and friends and sorted through more than 750 tips in the state's largest and most complex homicide investigation.

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine continues to say investigators know far more than they did in April. They have discovered things about Pike County they didn't know before, he said, declining to elaborate.

But they haven't uncovered enough, yet, apparently to name a suspect or make an arrest. DeWine and Pike County Sheriff Charles Reader have steadfastly refused to offer any inkling of a motive or disclose if they have one theory on who would want to kill Hannah Gilley and Frankie Rhoden as well as his dad, Christopher Rhoden Sr., 40; his mother, Dana Manley Rhoden, 37; his sister, Hanna Mae Rhoden, 19; his brother, Chris Rhoden, 16, his uncle, Kenneth Rhoden, 44; and a cousin, Gary Rhoden, 38.

They have also felt the growing frustration of the Rhoden and Gilley family members, who want justice for their loved ones. The cops, too, are frustrated. They are convinced folks in the tight-knit community know far more than they are saying.

Carver hasn't talked with Reader since May, despite phone calls to him. She does keep in contact with her victim advocate. The state's victim fund paid $5,843.89 for Gilley's funeral and $1,483.66 for her headstone.

That does little, however, to appease Carver.

"The case is getting more confusing, more confusing, more confusing," she said, shaking her head as she inhaled her cigarette. "It just gets more confusing as time continues to go by. I don't know what to think."

She said she has resigned herself to the belief the case will not be solved in her lifetime. She's working on coming to terms with that.

She also still doesn't know who has custody of Ruger -- who was found covered in blood but unharmed between his dead parents. He celebrated his first birthday last week, presumably with foster parents appointed by Pike County Children Services. She hopes there was cake.

She also can't talk about Hanna Rhoden's five-day-old baby girl, Kylie, who might also be Carver's grandchild. Her son, Charlie Gilley, was dating Hanna Rhoden at the time she became pregnant. Kylie Rhoden was found alive and unharmed and has been in state custody ever since. She turned six months old on the same day Ruger turned a year old.

A judge put a gag order on the custody cases involving Ruger and Kylie, which means Carver and other family members cannot discuss anything about the babies.

A grandmother is meant to boast.

Carver spends most days believing Hannah Gilley is still alive. Sometimes, she calls her older daughter, Meranda, to confirm that Hannah is dead. Meranda saw her sister after death; Carver did not.

"I can't believe she's dead. I keep saying: 'They could have put a dummy in that casket that looked like my Hannah, right?' " Carver said. "I know I'm in the biggest stage of denial.

"She shouldn't been took so young," Carver said, wiping away tears. "Hell, she wasn't even old enough to buy alcohol.

"She should be here, raising her baby.

"She should be here."

A mother isn't meant to outlive her child.

Chris Graves is the Enquirer's local columnist. She has covered the Pike County case from the very first day. You can email her at cgraves@enquirer.com.

Pike County: Death in the foothills

Reward offered

Anyone with information related to the case is asked to call Southern Ohio Crime Stoppers at 740-773-TIPS. Anonymous tips are still being taken at the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation at 855-BCI-OHIO (224-6446) or the Pike County Sheriff's Office at 740-947-2111.