Two-year-old Corey Edkin disappeared from his central Pennsylvania home in October 1986 and is still missing. His grandmother, Myrle Rovenolt, was accused of poisoning his grandfather two months later, and this past summer she was sentenced to life in prison for the poisoning death of her third husband. Corey and Myrle have connections to three other local cold cases – two homicides, and one disappearance presumed homicide – and that’s why we’re diving into the first of three episodes covering them. We’ll attempt to detangle an extensive web of information and get closer to resolution nearly 40 years later.
There are so many details and so much moving activity in these next three episodes that we’ll be refraining from listing every specific location to avoid confusion. Most of the events take place in central Pennsylvania, specifically Northumberland, Snyder, and Union counties within the Susquehanna Valley, just northeast of the state capital. This a primarily rural and industrial working-class region that includes the Appalachian Mountains and Susquehanna River. Sunbury is the largest city in the area, with a population of only about 12,000 in the 1980s and 1990s that’s been dwindling since. Other towns that feature in these cases, but we may not mention, include Hummels Wharf, Mifflinburg, Milton, New Columbia, Selinsgrove, Shamokin Dam, Turbotville, and Watsontown. You may be familiar with Knoebel’s Amusement Resort in Elysburg, considered the largest free admission amusement park in the country and a well-loved destination in the area.
Young, growing family
To begin understanding Corey Edkin’s case we must first begin by learning about his maternal grandmother, Myrle. High school students Myrle Smith, just turned 16, and Ronald Rovenolt announced their engagement in March 1961. Ron graduated high school and turned 18 that year. Their first child was a daughter named Debbie born in August 1962. Their second daughter, Rhonda, was born in October 1963. A son named Ronald Jr followed in February 1969, then a daughter named Jean in July 1971, and another son named Franklin in April 1973.
With the help of his farming family, Ron Rovenolt had established an agricultural business to support his wife and five children within that first decade or so. But in January 1976, fire destroyed his garage after an electric spark ignited an open pail of gasoline. Fortunately, the building was “partially covered by insurance.” In July of that same year, Myrle gave birth to the couple’s sixth child, a son named Paul. In November there was another small setback: Ron reported that someone had stolen $25 worth of his tools.
Grandchildren and fires
Myrle and Ron went on to have two more children – another son named Mark in March 1978 and a daughter named Rebecca in June 1980. That’s the same year that their first child Debbie, announced her engagement and then marriage to James Edkin. Debbie Rovenolt was 17 and had already stopped attending school, while James Edkin was finishing his senior year of high school. They would become the parents of missing Corey Edkin. Their first son, Tommy, was born in October 1980, just four months after Debbie’s youngest sibling was born. Myrle became a grandmother at the age of 35.
In February 1981, the Rovenolts experienced a second fire on their property, this time in a mobile home they rented to another couple, Mr. and Mrs. John Phillips. The property was insured, so the Rovenolts were able to recoup their losses. While no one was injured, the renters were left homeless. The cause was never determined. Two months later, Ron Rovenolt used $52 worth of bad checks at a local Montogomery Ward store, and he was ordered to pay $130 for the offense.
Debra and James Edkin welcomed a daughter, Nina, a year later in March 1982. They filed for divorce in October 1983, but their separation was temporary.
In March of 1984, the Rovenolts experienced their third fire, once again at the mobile home they rented out on their property. All four tenants were home when they noticed smoke coming from a living room closet. Douglas Walburn, 20, his fiancé Alberta Sones, 19, their child David Walburn, 3, and a friend of Rovenolt family, Sam Snyder, 58, escaped uninjured but were left homeless. The cause of the fire was determined to be accidental after hot cigarette butts ignited trash in a wastebasket. This time, the local Red Cross appealed to residents to help support the renters displaced by the blaze.
Drugs and more fire
Debbie gave birth to her and James Edkin’s second son and third child, Corey, in June 1984. Also in 1984, the Rovenolt’s 20-year-iold daughter, Rhonda, started dating Jon Schott, who she says introduced her to cocaine. We’ll hear more in the third part of these episodes how drug distribution rings were taking hold in the area around this time too. Rhonda later admitted that she and Jon “[got] high almost on a daily basis,” but she quit in November 1984 due to side effects. A month later, Jon robbed the convenience store where Rhonda worked as a clerk. He held a knife to her throat while her coworker helped him steal $1,100 in cash. Rhonda later asked Jon for half the money in exchange for her silence. When he seemingly disappeared afterward, Rhonda reported his crime to police.
When Debbie became the victim of her own house fire in December 1985, she was listed as a divorced single mother. Debbie was home at the time and was rescued by neighbors, while her son, Tommy, 3, was safe at Head Start. Her two younger children, Nina and Corey, were staying with their father, James Edkin, at the time. Debbie didn’t have renter’s insurance, but she was the recipient of the Milton community’s support, which was especially generous so close to the holidays.
Daniel Wise
After the fire, Debbie moved in with her parents, Myrle and Ronald Rovenolt, until she got back on her feet. She moved into another rental home on Second Street in New Columbia in January 1986, and she finalized her divorce with James that February. At some point in 1986, probably in early January, Debbie married her boyfriend, 25-year-old Daniel Wise. Daniel came with a record – he was arrested in 1984 for selling methamphetamine to an undercover officer during a regional sting operation. He was convicted and sentenced in March 1985 to serve three to 23 months of jailtime, and he appears to have served the lower end of his sentence.
Daniel Wise added to that record when he was arrested again in January 1986 for rape, while he and Debbie were together. “Police didn’t say who reported the rape,” but it occurred in a private residence on January 21. The victim was Debbie’s 14-year-old sister. Daniel was charged in May 1986 with two counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse. He plead guilty and was sentenced according to a plea deal that allowed him to serve concurrent sentences of 2.5-5 years for the corruption of a minor and 1-2 years for indecent exposure and indecent assault while the rape charges were dropped.
Debbie’s roommate at her New Columbia home had several things in common with Debbie, and criminal boyfriends was one of them. Her roommate was Alberta Sones, the same woman who was left homeless by a fire when she was renting a mobile home from Debbie’s parents. Alberta’s fiancé at the time, Douglas Walburn, was first arrested when he was only 16 years old.
That first arrest was for setting fire to an abandoned building in August 1979. Douglas was also charged with stealing $25 from a feed mill and the theft of a motor vehicle. In February 1980, he was ordered to pay restitution and serve two years’ probation for those crimes. Alberta gave birth to their son in January 1981, and that June, he stole equipment and furniture from a local elementary school. In October, he stole $325 worth of coins, jewelry, and antiques from a private residence. In November, he stole a chalice worth about $200 from a local church. Douglas would plead guilty to all these charges once he was caught, and in December 1982, he was ordered to serve three to 23 months in prison followed by two more years of probation.
Douglas was out by the time he and Alberta experienced the fire at Ron and Myrle and Rovenolt’s property in 1984, but it’s unclear exactly when he and Alberta split up. In the fall of 1986, when Corey Edkin went missing from the home Debbie and Alberta shared, Douglas Walburn is not mentioned.
Douglas seemed to stay out of trouble until 1987, when he got in a fist fight with his brother and burned his father’s home down afterward. In 1988, Douglas was sentenced to 3-10 years for that arson, and he would continue to accumulate drug, DUI, and assault charges until his death in 2012:
Late on a Sunday night, October 12, 1986, Debbie and Alberta, both 24 years old, were hanging out watching television and playing cards. A phone call interrupted their game. Debbie answered, but when she asked, “Who’s there?” she heard nothing but breathing before the caller hung up. It was the latest in a series of strange calls received at their home since about 6:00pm the night before.
Debbie said it was this interruption that helped her remember that she needed gas for work the next day, and she decided to travel to a nearby station to fill up. She told Alberta she would also pick up some pizza for them to snack on when she returned. Debbie checked on her two sleeping children upstairs before she left the house at about 12:10 am – her daughter, Nina, 4, and her son, Corey, 2. Corey was fast asleep in his mother’s bed, having moved there from his own around 11:00pm because of a spider in his bedroom.
Alberta also had two children living in the home, a 2-year-old daughter and a 4-year-old son, also asleep upstairs. Alberta stayed behind while Debbie ran out, first going up to her bedroom for about 10 minutes, and then going back downstairs to work in the kitchen. She was still in the kitchen when Debbie returned around 12:40am, roughly 30 minutes later. Debbie noticed that the back door was open, but Alberta said no one had entered or left the home, and all the children were still fast asleep.
But when Debbie went upstairs to check, Corey was no longer in his mother’s bed. He wasn’t in his own bed either. Debbie called police after about 30 minutes of frantically and unsuccessfully searching for Corey.
Early, intense search
Officers immediately conducted a door-to-door search of the New Columbia neighborhood from which the toddler disappeared. The next day, a helicopter was used to search the Susquehanna River, located about 200 yards from Corey’s home, while more than 50 volunteers assisted investigators by combing the riverbanks, backyards, pools, wooded areas, and sheds in the area. Investigators theorized that Corey might have followed his mother out of the house when she left for gas.
Police began using lie detector tests during their interviews within two days of Corey’s disappearance, although they clarified that the people being interviewed were not suspected of any criminal activity. They confirmed Debbie’s gas station trip, and her roommate Alberta passed a polygraph.
By the end of the week, 16 divers and nine search and rescue dogs had thoroughly covered the area with no results. One dog did detect a “human scent” by some railroad tracks, but it turned out to be a leaking sewer line. Police called off the search but promised “we haven’t ruled out anything.”
Poisoning and affair
While Corey’s case grew cold, troubles continued for his immediate family. By November 1986, one month after his disappearance, Corey’s grandfather, Ron Rovenolt, was hospitalized after he became “violently ill.” At first, he thought it might be a bad flu. As his symptoms worsened, doctors diagnosed him with leukemia. Bone marrow tests in December indicated that Ron had actually been poisoned with “a potentially lethal dose” of arsenic.
Hospital staff notified the police, who opened an investigation. Ron would stay in the hospital “almost continuously” through April 1987. Formerly in “excellent health,” Ron had suffered permanent damage to his internal organs and nervous system that limited the use of his hands, arms, and legs and prevented him from being able to walk without a cane.
At some point in 1986, Corey’s grandmother, Myrle Rovenolt, had begun an affair with her neighbor, Jack Plotts. Myrle says she and Jack didn’t start seeing each other until after her husband Ron was first hospitalized, but Ron says their relationship started about six months earlier, around Easter 1986. By the time he became sick, Ron says that he had already discovered the affair and begun discussing the divorce process with Myrle. In March 1987, shortly before Ron’s final discharge, Myrle and Jack Plotts moved in together.
Threats and pleas
While police were still investigating Ron’s poisoning, they reported little movement on Corey Edkin’s case. That was until March of 1987, when The Daily Item, a Sunbury-based newspaper, began receiving threatening phone calls regarding Corey’s disappearance. The first came at 9:30am on March 19, a Thursday. In the taped message, an unidentified female voice said, “Corey is alive. Tell Jim we will get Corey back.” She also threatened to kill a woman but didn’t provide her name or details.
Two more calls came the following Tuesday morning, March 24. At 8:35am, a “low and raspy” voice speaking “slowly,” said that Corey would “be murdered in seven days.” The next call came at 9:47am, from the same person, saying, “Debbie is going to lose two people close to her.” Police determined that the caller was the same woman who called the paper on the 19th.
After news of the phone calls broke, one of Corey’s aunts wrote a heartfelt plea to his abductor(s), which was published in the same newspaper:
“I am asking you, begging you, whoever you are, to please return Corey to his home even if that is through me. I would do anything to see my nephew again. … If I had a million dollars, it would be yours in exchange for my nephew. But unfortunately, I haven’t any money at all. Instead, I offer you my sincerity. All I want is Corey back unharmed. Please let me know that he is well, and I will help return him without involving the authorities. I beg of you to end this suffering of all of us. We love Corey and pray to God for his safe return.”
In June of 1987, Corey’s mother, Debbie, and another relative received several ransom calls. One caller threatened to sell Corey for $25,000. The calls stopped when police put tracing equipment on Debbie’s phone.
Tips
In October of 1987, Debbie gave birth to her fourth child, a daughter named Keara, with her boyfriend Frank Derr. That same month, one year after his disappearance, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children printed Corey Edkin’s photo on milk cartons and utility bills across the country. Within one day, police had more than 50 calls from 28 states reporting tips and sightings. For a time, they consistently received about 15 calls per day, eventually hearing from all 50 states.
Unfortunately, none of the information resulted in a viable lead. One sighting in nearby Harrisburg, Pennsylvania was promising enough for police to conduct a stakeout, but it was yet another dead end.
Myrle’s first arrest
That year ended with Myrle and Ron Rovenolt, both 42 years old, filing for divorce just a few days before Christmas 1987. Myrle was arrested a little over a week later and charged with attempting to murder Ron. She was accused of poisoning his mixed drinks twice in November 1986 with “sweet-tasting ant poison” that the couple kept around the house. Myrle’s affair with Jack Plotts was presented as a potential motive for killing her husband.
Myrle insisted that she was innocent and blamed Ron’s poisoning on his own careless use of herbicide on their farm property. She provided a sample to investigators that proved to contain high levels of arsenic. However, a second sample provided by Ron’s brother, as well as a third sample collected directly from Ron’s sprayer, tested negative for arsenic.
One of the couple’s daughters, Rhonda, told investigators about a conversation she overheard between Myrle and her boyfriend Jack in July 1987 in which they were discussing financial problems involving Jack’s ex-wife. Rhonda claims that Jack laughed and asked Myrle “if she had any more poison around,” implying that they could solve his martial problems through another poisoning. Jack would argue that Rhonda simply misunderstood his “off-the-wall” joke.
Myrle faced more charges on January 21, 1988, just a few weeks after her arrest for attempted homicide. This time she was accused of stealing two rifles from a private residence in December 1987 and giving them to her boyfriend, Jack.
Myrle’s first trial
More details of the poisoning investigation surfaced during Myrle’s preliminary hearing. Medical experts testified that Ron Rovenolt had an “astonishing level” of arsenic in his urine when it was tested in December 1986, several weeks after he first became ill. His symptoms indicated a large dosing rather than low level doses over time, and it was not possible for Ron to have inhaled or absorbed the arsenic through his skin. Ron admitted to using ant killer with arsenic around the house. However, it couldn’t be tested because Myrle removed it after the investigation began, allegedly telling Ron, “They’ll probably accuse me of trying to poison you.”
Myrle entered a not guilty plea and went before a jury of 10 women and two men in July 1988. Myrle and Ron’s daughter, Rhonda, testified to Myrle’s suspicious conversation with Jack but also about her father’s abusive behavior toward her mother, the children, and their pets. She said that Myrle was afraid of Ron and that “the only thing [Myrle] did wrong was not take us kids and leave my dad a long time ago.” Myrle testified in her own defense, sharing stories of Ron’s “constant abuse.” She claimed that Ron “frequently” accused her of poisoning him, falsely, and said she drank half of one of the mixed drinks he now alleges was laced with arsenic.
Ron’s improper use of toxic chemicals around the farm also came up during the trial, but not just from Myrle. Myrle said that Ron would mix herbicide barehanded in a 55-gallon drum. A friend of the family confirmed this and testified to also witnessing Ron spraying without protective gear. “I told Ron about the possible precautions, and Ron said it would be all right. I thought it was careless to disregard the warnings.” A state pesticide specialist testified that spray falling onto Ron’s face could cause the throat damage he suffered, but not his other injuries.
One of Myrle and Ron’s sons, 12-year-old Paul, testified that his father told him that he had poisoned himself after he discovered Myrle’s affair and planned to accuse her of the crime. Ron Rovenolt denied that conversation ever happened and questioned the sense in such a plot.
Ron said that he and Myrle had been arguing over finances leading up to the poisoning because they were preparing for a divorce in light of the affair. Ron owned five properties related to his business, but Myrle was bitter that he never included her name on the deeds. Ron would eventually add Myrle’s name to two of them. Ron said Myrle also asked him to change his will so that everything was left to her instead of their children, but he never did. Additionally, Myrle knew about two $25,000 life insurance policies that Ron took out in 1985, payable to her, but he switched the beneficiary over to his children after the poisoning.
Before the jury began deliberations, Myrle’s defense attorney hammered home the point that even though Ron could prove that he was poisoned, there is no proof of “where the arsenic came from.” It could have come from anyone who may have wanted to poison Ron and had access to his property, or it could have been accidental. The jury returned a not guilty verdict after about seven hours. Myrle was relieved, telling reporters, “I know I didn’t do it. [Ron] has tried to manipulate the kids and I for a long time.”
Confrontation
While the jury deliberated, Ron’s oldest daughters, 26-year-old Debbie and 24-year-old Rhonda confronted him in the hallway outside the courtroom, accusing him of mental, physical, and sexual abuse.
Rhonda: “Dad, we thought since we’ve got reporters here and you’re here, why don’t we have a little conflict and talk about some things?”
Ronald: “I have nothing to say to you. You are a two-faced liar.”
Debbie: “You came back from church and started throwing me into the stove, the table, the refrigerator – I’m bleeding all over, and I can’t even remember what I did wrong.”
Ronald: “No comment.”
Rhonda: “Do you know what I want to do? I want to get access to as many records as I can and bring it all out. … I have so much hatred for this guy. I never hated anybody so much. I have a handgun and I can’t say for sure some day I’m not going to go after him.”
The confrontation lasted about 20 minutes before the defense attorney and District Attorney were finally able to break it up. Ron and Myrle’s six other children were between the ages of eight and 19, and Children and Youth Services were working to determine appropriate custody arrangements in the wake of the trial. Debbie “said she will do her best to see that her father does not get custody.”
We’ll continue our coverage in part two, where we’ll learn more about the Rovenolt family and the numerous crimes Myrle is connected to, including a burglary ring and two homicides, one of which is still unsolved. We’ll also discuss the developments in Corey Edkin’s case, including a recent arrest.
We remind you that if you have any information regarding Corey’s disappearance, or any other serious crime, to contact Pennsylvania Crime Stoppers at 1-800-4PA-TIPS or online here.
