Darlene Hamlin speaks out about son's killing
Darlene Hamlin, who is still waiting for her son's killer or killers to be arrested nine years after his battered body was found in a Ledyard field, said Thursday that she is finished keeping quiet about strange things that happened in the days and months after Anthony Hamlin died.
"I know people know who did it," Darlene Hamlin said during an interview at her home in Stonington. "I want these murderers found and prosecuted."
Anthony Hamlin, a 40-year-old father of five from Groton and a member of the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation, was last seen near Union Station in downtown New London, where he planned to catch a train to Virginia on the night of Jan. 27, 2006.
His body was discovered the next morning in a field adjacent to 448 Shewville Road in Ledyard about 8:30 a.m. He died from blunt force trauma to the head, and his killer or killers left him face down and naked in a former horse pasture.
The state police Eastern District Major Crime Squad is investigating with assistance from the New London County Cold Case Task Force and the Federal Bureau of Investigations.
Darlene Hamlin said she was advised by police not to use the names of possible witnesses or persons of interest in the case, but she wanted to let the public know about incidents that have haunted her for years.
She said that a few days after Hamlin's death, a local dog groomer called Darlene Hamlin's sister, Darien Hamlin, and told her that the people who killed Anthony Hamlin wanted his mother to know that, "They didn't mean to kill him. They just meant to hurt him." Her sister was a customer of the grooming business, which has since closed. Hamlin said she did not know the woman and does not know where she lives now.
"Who contacted her to call me, and how did they know it was my sister?" Hamlin said. "These are questions that have been unanswered for a long period of time."
Also, Hamlin said, she learned that a longtime friend of the family paid for her son's trip from Virginia, where he had found a surveying job that was scheduled to begin the Monday after his death, to Connecticut for that weekend. To her knowledge, she said, her son was not romantically involved with the woman, who was older than him. She wonders why the woman, with whom she no longer has contact, would have paid for the trip. The woman had worked with the Eastern Pequots when the tribe was attempting to get federal recognition in the early 2000s.
Hamlin said the woman approached her one day at work and told her, "I know who killed your son." But when she invited the woman to her house to talk about it, the woman told her, 'I can't tell you, because they threatened to kill me,'" Hamlin said.
These and other strange incidents have convinced her that "somebody very close" was responsible for her son's death, Hamlin said. The rumors have swirled throughout the area's American Indian community and Hamlin said she doesn't know what to believe.
"It's a possibility my son was involved with individuals he shouldn't have been involved with, but he did not deserve to die," she said.
Hamlin said she had never seen her son high on drugs, though he did drink alcohol. Anthony Hamlin was "very much a family man" who always cooked Sunday dinner and was the first one to arrive and set up for picnics and other gatherings, she said.
"Why would they kill my son?" she said. "Was it money? Was it something he knew, or was it over a girl?"
Hamlin attended Survivors of Homicide support group meetings for years after her son's death, but one by one, the cases of the other victims were resolved.
"I can't go anymore," she said. "It hurts too much."
Police conducted a search of the crime scene last year and said the investigation remains active. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has authorized a $50,000 award for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Hamlin's killers.
Inspector Kenneth W. Edwards Jr. of the chief state's attorney's office said the cold case task force, made up of police from throughout the region, is engaged with the major crime squad and discusses the case weekly.
"Assignments are given and we're developing strategies for the investigation," Edwards said in a brief phone interview Thursday.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Connecticut Cold Case Hotline at (866) 623-8058, Connecticut State Police Eastern District Major Crime Squad at (860) 896-3230 or the New London State's Attorney's office at (860) 443-2835.
k.florin@theday.com
Twitter: @KFLORIN
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