The location where Sherry Lynn Marler went missing
Last Seen Location in Greenville, Alabama
This is the location where Sherry Lynn Marler went missing.
It is situated at the corner of West Commerce Street and Fort Dale Street in Greenville, Alabama.
On the morning of Wednesday, June 6th, 1984, the 12-year-old accompanied her stepfather, Raymond Stringfellow, to the First National Bank at 100 West Commerce Street.
That day, Raymond needed to sign some paperwork, and Sherry had asked if she could tag along.
After parking his red pickup truck outside the bank, Raymond exited the vehicle. Before closing the door, he placed a dollar bill on the seat so that Sherry could purchase a soda at the Chevron gas station across the street.
As Raymond was walking towards the bank, he heard Sherry closing the passenger-side door of his truck.
Roughly fifteen minutes later, he returned and noticed that his stepdaughter was still gone. Wondering what the delay was, he began looking for her.
After failing to find Sherry, Raymond eventually decided to call the police. By that point, two hours had passed since she disappeared.
Although family members, friends, and local volunteers immediately carried out a search of the area, no trace of the missing girl was ever found.
During the investigation, it was determined that no one except Raymond had seen Sherry in town that day. One anonymous source confidently told the local newspaper that they would have seen the 12-year-old had she visited Greenville that morning.
Following her disappearance, there were reported sightings of her in places such as Mississippi, Georgia, and New Orleans. Unfortunately, none of them turned out to be credible.
Investigators do not believe that a stranger abducted Sherry, as they would have found it very difficult to drive into the downtown area of a small, close-knit community and kidnap a girl off the street without being noticed.
Raymond was cooperative with the police and answered all of their questions. However, he refused to take a polygraph test.
There has been almost no movement in the case over the past four decades, as all of the tips and alledged sightings have led nowhere.
The only fact that seems certain is that a young girl vanished on that summer morning in 1984 and was never seen again.
To this day, Sherry Lynn Marler remains listed as a missing person.
Sherry Lynn Marler last seen location
The address and the GPS coordinates for this location are as follows:
Address
100 W Commerce Street, Greenville, Alabama, AL 36037, USA
GPS coordinates
The latitude and longitude coordinates for the bank are:
31.829673, -86.624452
Directions
The First National Bank was situated on the corner of West Commerce Street and Fort Dale Street in downtown Greenville. The Chevron gas station was directly across the road.
Details about the general area
Greenville is a small city in Butler County, Alabama. It is roughly 35 miles southwest of Montgomery.
Photos
Photos of the bank and other related images.
First National Bank
Image source: Google Maps
This Google Street View image of 100 West Commerce Street was taken in April 2022.
At the time of Sherry Lynn Marler's disappearance, the building was home to the First National Bank. These days, it is the location of Poole & Poole Attorneys.
Raymond Stringfellow parked his pickup truck outside the bank at 9.30 a.m. He then left a dollar bill on the seat before going inside to fill out some paperwork.
Gas station
The Chevron gas station was directly across the road, on the corner of West Commerce Street and Church Street.
The location where Sherry Marler went missing
This Google Street View image provides a wider view of the intersection where Sherry went missing.
After parking his truck, Raymond went into the bank. Meanwhile, Sherry reportedly exited the vehicle and walked across the street to the gas station.
Raymond said that he gave his stepdaughter a dollar bill because she was thirsty.
Following her disappearance, all of her friends and acquaintances were contacted. However, none of them remembered seeing her that day.
The police reached out to the public and drove around the surrounding roads. Flyers containing her photograph were also distributed throughout the town.
One month after she went missing, Greenville Police Chief Kenneth Flowers stated the following:
"Runaways are usually found within a few days, and that is why we suspect foul play may be involved."
A number of websites claim that witnesses saw Sherry walking across the road that day. However, this is false.
In 1986, Greenville Police Captain Thomas L. Tutchtone explicitly told the Birmingham Post-Herald newspaper that no one in the town recalled seeing Sherry. He also expressed his doubts that a stranger snatched her off the street:
"This is not like Birmingham or any other big city. If you saw someone you didn't know, you'd quickly find out who it is."
Police Chief Lonzo Ingram, who replaced Kenneth Flowers, also dismissed the theory:
"I have a hard time believing that she was snatched off the street by a perfect stranger in Greenville."
That day, there were no reports of any strangers in the town.
Polygraph
Image source: Birmingham Post-Herald - April 23rd, 1986
Raymond Stringfellow refused to take a lie detector test.
Raymond Stringfellow
This photograph of Raymond and Betty Stringfellow appeared in the Birmingham Post-Herald in 1986.
During an interview with the newspaper, he expressed his belief that his stepdaughter got into a car with someone she knew.
Theories
One anonymous source confidently stated that they would have seen Sherry if she was in Greenville that morning.
Factoids and unsubstantiated claims have muddied the details surrounding Marler's disappearance.
For example, a number of websites say that the young girl was seen in the presence of a weathered-looking man called "B.J." Unfortunately, the information about these sightings is vague and unsourced. Furthermore, the police have made it extremely clear that all of the supposed sightings lacked proof.
A number of articles claim that witnesses saw her walking across the street. As we pointed out above, this is false, as nobody except Raymond Stringfellow saw her that day.
Other sites report that Raymond was ruled out as a suspect. Again, we were unable to find any statement to back up such a claim. Instead, we found this 2013 quote from Police Chief Lonzo Ingram, which says otherwise:
"The case is never far from my mind. We push hard, but it's frustrating when we can't seem to obtain some good results. When something like this happens, you try to eliminate family members first as possible suspects. That's just what we've tried to do. He was offered the opportunity to take a polygraph test but declined."
Discrepancy
While we were researching this case, we noticed a slight discrepancy in the story about how Raymond agreed to bring Sherry into town.
In 1986, Raymond said that Sherry walked into the kitchen, put on her shoes, and informed him that she was accompanying him to Greenville.
However, roughly ten years ago, Sherry's mother, Betty Stringfellow, recalled a different story that her husband had told her. In her version, Sherry came running out of the house with her shoes in her hand while he was backing out of the driveway.
Although the passage of time does blur details, we feel as though this discrepancy is still worthy of attention.
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