20/20: Blood Money

ByABC News
March 30, 2001, 1:47 PM

March 30 -- John and Theresa Vanderheiden are desperate to find the body of their daughter Cyndi who was raped and murdered in 1998.

The family will reward $20,000 to anyone who can lead them to her body except the one person who wants to take their offer: the man convicted of perpetrating the horrible crime.

The man is Wesley Shermantine, an inmate at Santa Clara County Main Jail in San Jose, Calif. He says he knows where Cyndi's body is as well as the body of Chevy Wheeler whom he is convicted of murdering in 1985. To divulge the information, he feels he can fairly claim the $20,000.

Cruel Taunts

Investigators speculate that over the last 15 years he hunted men and women alike in California's San Joaquin Valley, claiming as many as 20 other victims.

Last February he was sentenced to death after a jury found him guilty of killing Paul Cavanaugh, 31, Howard King, 35, Wheeler, 16, and Vanderheiden who was 25.

Cavanaugh and King were found shot to death on a quiet road, but the bodies of Wheeler and Vanderheiden are still missing. Their families, desperate for closure, are suffering the cruel taunts from Shermantine.

Det. Deborah Scheffel, one of the officers on the case, says Shermantine "has continued to be able to manipulate and control, from inside a jail cell." Sheffel says, "It is the most obscene thing I have ever heard of. It's just beyond words."

Families Come Together

Fifteen years ago, Paula and Raymond Wheeler's daughter, Chevy, disappeared after skipping school."I took her to school about 7:20 that day. I dropped her off, and she said, 'Bye mom. I love you and I'll call you at two.' And I turned around and went back and I never saw her again," Mrs. Wheeler remembers.

Authorities found traces of her blood in Shermantine's cabin, but since DNA testing was not yet available, the killer went unpunished for more than a decade.

"I knew who killed her ... and I couldn't do anything about it," says Mr. Wheeler.