Another Christmas disaster with a sinister twist. The girl was said to have been involved with a married man, by consent or by force, we never can tell but one thing is for sure, that later on she felt threatened to even step out by her self.
If truly she was involved with a married man, then I'd say there are other subtle way of dealing with the issue that to kill her, that is if wife of the married man was behind this.....
There is also the option of it being her boyfriend but that didn't hold so much water in it, as he wasn't so mentioned in the case but it was definitely somebody she knew because based on various statements and actions she made prior to her death, investigators believe that she may have known her killer. Her family does not believe that she would have stopped her car for a stranger, they believe that she stopped for someone she knew.
The Murder Of Rhonda Hinson
On the night of December 22, 1981, just three days before Christmas, nineteen-year-old Rhonda Hinson attended her first office Christmas party. She had recently graduated from high school in Valdese, North Carolina, and started a job as a clerical worker for a local steel company. At around midnight, she and two of her friends left the party and headed home. At approximately 12:30AM, she dropped off her friends and began the ten mile drive back home, where she still lived with her parents in Valdese when she became the victim of a bizarre homicide.
A high-powered rifle was used to fire a shot at Rhonda’s vehicle from an unknown location. The bullet managed to travel through the trunk and the driver’s seat before striking Rhonda in the heart. Her car was discovered on Mineral Springs Mountain Road, just a half mile from her home. The driver's door was opened, and just a few feet away, she was found dead. She was lying on her back, with her arms deliberately placed at her side. Police believed at first that her murder was a random act of violence until an investigation revealed that she may have known her killer. The circumstances of how or why she was murdered remain unclear.
Prior to her murder, Rhonda had been acting strangely toward her parents in the preceding weeks. She dropped hints that she was concealing a terrible secret and although she was normally comfortable driving alone, she began to ask her father Bobby to accompany her on trips into town. During one of these trips, she said that she had something to tell him, and that it was bad. When he asked her to explain further, she said she'd think about it. However, she never explained to him what was troubling her. Then she made an unusual inquiry to her mother, Rhonda asked her if it was ever okay to be in a relationship with a married man. Judy said it was never okay, because it would only end in people getting hurt. She did not know why Rhonda asked this question; she did not know if Rhonda was asking for herself or for a friend.
In the weeks prior to her murder, her parents noticed that she was suffering from insomnia. She also began getting up in the middle of the night and taking showers. She told her mother that she "felt dirty". According to police, this is usually the behavior of someone who has been sexually abused. This unusual behavior suggested to police that she was under some kind of pressure.
Police also uncovered evidence that suggested that Rhonda was being stalked by someone on the night of her death. On the night of the murder, between 12:15 and 12:30AM, a witness drove under the Interstate 40 bridge on Mineral Springs Mountain Road. She observed a blue GM Chevrolet facing in a northerly direction, with two white males inside. The car was parked next to the same off-ramp that Rhonda would later use to exit. It was spotted just thirty minutes before Rhonda was shot and just two-hundred yards from where her body was found.
Later that evening, a motorist traveling down the same road passed by a similar blue vehicle, with a single man behind the wheel. This vehicle was speeding away from the murder site. As he continued down the road, the witness saw Rhonda's vehicle at the same spot where her body would be found. The witness saw her slumped over the steering wheel with an unidentified man standing at the front driver's side door, assuming that they were a drunk couple, he drove on.
The witness did not know that Rhonda was dead at the time, but he did see a Trans-Am parked down the road a short distance away, which may have belonged to the man seen next to Rhonda’s vehicle. If this man fired the fatal rifle shot from a distance, why did he approach her car and drag Rhonda’s body out onto the road? Was her death an accident or cold-blooded murder? These questions remain unanswered. Her murder has never been solved, and a $20,000 reward is being offered for information.
She was only able to live such short life and that is just so heartbreaking. They say keep your friends close and your enemies closer, but then how are you going to know all your enemies when some despise disguise as friends?
Perhaps a woman should know better... Most women are killed by someone they know and trust which means in Rhonda's case her friends are her enemies. ☹👍🍀