 It was 1992, and Shanda Sherer was just 12 years old. She recently moved to a new school and was having trouble with one particular girl who just wouldn't leave her alone. The girl would send Shanda countless threatening letters, with each letter growing more and more violent than the last. This all culminated in one seriously disturbing crime that investigators simply couldn't understand. Shanda would eventually go missing, but two of her so-called friends would soon make a shocking confession that no one could have seen coming. Detectives were left speechless, questioning how a few teenage girls could have such twisted minds and carry out a crime of such vile and repulsive proportions. This is one story you won't want to miss. Shanda Sherer was born in Pineville, Kentucky, back in June of 1979. Her parents, Stephen and Jacqueline, were deeply in love at the time of her birth, unfortunately their marriage simply didn't stand the test of time. I can't tell exactly when this took place, but the two divorced while Shanda was still quite young. After the two were divorced, it didn't take too long for Jacqueline to get remarried, moving to Louisville to live with her new husband. Here, Shanda would begin attending her fifth and sixth grade school years at St. Paul. Shanda got on very well at St. Paul and was able to find many friends here, very quickly becoming a member of the in-crowd. Shanda would go on to play volleyball and softball and was even accepted onto the school's cheerleading team. It was very clear to everyone that Shanda was destined for greatness, but her success wouldn't last very long. The details of the situation have never been made public, but for some reason, Shanda's mother once again got divorced and once again decided to pull Shanda from school and transfer her to yet another middle school. This time, Shanda and her mother moved to New Albany, Indiana, reportedly so Shanda could be closer to her biological father. Though I wasn't able to confirm whether or not this was entirely true, as all the records I could find simply said that Shanda's father lived in the neighboring state of Kentucky. They never got more specific than that. In 1991, after settling down in New Albany, Shanda was enrolled at Hazelwood Middle School. I'm sure as is true with most kids, Shanda was terrified about having to start a new school and make new friends. And for this to have happened to her twice over the span of just a few years, I'm sure it only made things that much more difficult for her. But it certainly didn't help things when Shanda almost immediately began getting into fights at her new school. See, the kids in Shanda's past always welcomed her with open arms, and she was always considered to be one of the popular girls. But at Hazelwood, things were much different. Just a few days after starting school, a girl named Amanda Hevrin came into the picture and appears to have been dead set on making Shanda's life miserable. Now, we don't know who started the bullying, but before long, they were both deeply involved in it. The two girls got into a fistfight with one another on at least one occasion, and Shanda's mom seems to have suggested that Amanda was the one to throw the first punch, though, admittedly, this is all rather irrelevant because they both ended up in detention regardless. But things got a bit weird from here. Once the two were forced to sit beside one another in detention, they actually got to know each other and found out they had a lot in common. While Shanda's mom certainly had some reservations about Amanda, considering they just bended each other's throats just days before, Jacqueline was just happy that Shanda was beginning to make new friends. But things got a lot more serious for the girls from here. As it would turn out, Amanda didn't simply want to be friends. She wanted to be much more than that. The two girls would often pass notes to one another in class and in detention, and Amanda began to ask questions about Shanda, specifically asking if she liked girls. Amanda would compliment her clothes and always made sure to tell Shanda how pretty she was. Now, we've all heard the stories of how kids bully each other, not specifically to be mean, but because they secretly like each other but don't know what to do with these complex emotions. Well, this seems to have been the case here as well, because before long, Shanda and Amanda began a romantic relationship with one another and even went to the school's fall dance together, something that was really daring for a couple young kids in a strongly conservative state in 1992. But this dance wouldn't lead to the happy memories that the two had hoped for. While the dance itself went along perfectly, issues began to arise when Shanda was introduced to a 16-year-old girl named Melinda Loveless. The only problem was Melinda wasn't looking to become friends. That's because in her eyes, Shanda had stolen her girlfriend. See, Melinda had been dating Amanda for about a year, and to a teenager, a year may as well have been a lifetime. The two broke up a short while before Amanda met Shanda, but Melinda hadn't healed from the breakup just yet. At the dance, Amanda repeatedly threatened Shanda, and days later, she began writing hateful letters to Amanda, expressing how much she hated the fact that Amanda and Shanda were spending so much time together. This is where things began to get a bit complicated. Now, I mentioned that Amanda and Melinda had broken up, but this isn't entirely accurate. While Amanda was certainly under the belief that the two had broken up, Melinda hadn't really accepted the breakup. She felt that the two were just having problems and that they would eventually work things out. But it seems as though Amanda had checked out of the situation entirely. So while Amanda thought that she was in the clear to start dating other people, Melinda was stuck in the mindset that Amanda was cheating on her. This was all made worse by the fact that while all of this was taking place, Melinda's father had just left the family high and dry, and her mother was quickly moving on to someone else. Needless to say, Melinda was already feeling completely betrayed by her family, and the last thing she needed was to be betrayed by her girlfriend as well. These compounded emotions were too much for Melinda to handle, and before long, she wanted revenge. It was late 1991 at this point in the story. Melinda was at an all-time low, but somehow she felt like she couldn't stop herself from sinking even lower. It's been reported by Midwest Crime Files that Melinda and all of her older sisters decided to come out to their mother around this time. Apparently, while Melinda had come out at school a long time ago, her mother was blissfully unaware. But no sooner than Melinda came out, all of her siblings joined in to back her up and express their relationship preferences as well. Melinda's mother was shocked by this to say the least. In fact, some reports claim she was downright furious, but as time passed by, she had come to accept her children's decisions. By November of that year, Shanda's mother began to have the same realization as Melinda's mother. But unfortunately for her, Shanda didn't trust her mother enough to directly come out and tell her how she'd been feeling about other girls. Instead, Shanda and Amanda kept their relationship a secret, pretending to simply be friends around Shanda's family. But one day, Shanda's mother came across a series of handwritten notes that were shared between Shanda and Amanda and what she learned shocked her to her core. While we don't know the specific contents of these notes, Shanda's mother says that they were very clearly revealing that the two were far more than friends and certain details suggest that the two had been involved in a physical relationship with one another. Shanda's mother immediately forbade her from hanging out with Amanda anymore, but as is true with most teens, this didn't stop Shanda from doing what she wanted to do. All it caused her to do was be more secretive about it. According to Shanda's mother, her issue wasn't with Shanda being interested in other girls, her issue was with the age gap between the two. Amanda was 14 at the time and Shanda was just 12. Well, two years isn't really a big difference in the grander scheme of things. You gotta remember to younger kids, even an age difference of six months can make a world of difference in terms of your maturity or mental ability and your decision-making skills. In her mother's own words, Shanda was still a baby and she felt that she was being pressured into doing things she wasn't comfortable with. Now she may have been right about this or she may have been completely wrong. We just don't know. But that was all beside the point because things were about to get much darker. Rumors had begun to spread that Melinda was truly livid with Amanda for seemingly stepping outside the relationship. But it doesn't appear as though she was specifically mad at Amanda. Instead, she was mad at Shanda. These rumors suggested that Melinda wasn't going to sit back and watch this all unfold. She was gonna do something about it. By the fall of 1991, Melinda had begun to publicly discuss her plans of ending Shanda's life. Melinda began to deliver more and more threatening letters to both Amanda and Shanda. And Amanda grew so concerned that she began turning the letters into a local youth prosecutor. But the problem was the prosecutor didn't take the threat seriously. In fact, in Amanda's opinion, the prosecutor never followed up on the letters at all. Now, we obviously don't know if this is 100% accurate, but as far as the evidence suggests, there's nothing that would suggest any sort of investigation took place during this time. And things were about to get very serious very quickly. It was January 10th, 1992, a night that Melinda had been anticipating for a very long time. Melinda had spoken with three of her friends, Laurie Tackett, Hope Rippy, and Tony Lawrence, and asked him to come over to her house that afternoon. Once the three arrived, Melinda revealed that she'd concocted a plan to get Shanda away from Amanda once and for all. She then showed the girls a knife. Melinda explained that she was going to use the knife to scare Shanda into breaking up with Amanda. She told her friends that she believed Shanda was nothing more than a copycat that stole her girlfriend. The girls had learned that Shanda had been staying with her father on the weekends, with Shanda's father living in Jeffersonville at this point. It appears that Laurie must have either owned or borrowed a car, and the girls all headed towards Shanda's father's house. Once they arrived, they came up with the plan. Two of the girls knocked on the front door of the home and claimed to be friends of Amanda, saying that they were on their way to meet Amanda, but that Amanda had requested that they all stop by to pick up Shanda along the way. They urged Shanda to get into the car so that they could meet at an old abandoned house nearby, known locally as the Witch's Castle. Shanda wanted to go with the girls, but she knew her parents wouldn't allow her to. It was still fairly early at this point, but Shanda assured them she'd be able to sneak out if they came back around midnight. Melinda was incredibly angry about this, but they left anyway and attended a local concert while they waited. The girls began to drive back towards Shanda's house around 12.30 a.m. And remember at this point, all the girls believed that Melinda simply wanted to scare Shanda into breaking up with Amanda, but things began to get more and more twisted as the ride progressed. And before long, Melinda spoke out and said, she couldn't wait to kill Shanda. Naturally, this change in plans shocked the girls, but if I had to take a guess, I'd say the girls probably didn't think Melinda was actually serious, but they had no idea how wrong they would be. When the girls finally arrived at the house, Tawny refused to coerce Shanda into the car. Seemingly having a change of heart after learning about the links, Melinda was willing to go to, but that's just a guess. Either way, two of the other girls went to speak with Shanda while Melinda ducked down into the back seat and hid under a blanket, clinging to a knife that she had brought with her. Shanda was a bit reluctant to go with the girls. I don't know if she sensed something was wrong or if she just believed that she would get into trouble, but regardless, the girls talked her into leaving and just minutes later, Shanda got into the car with them. As the group drove down the road toward the Witches Castle, Melinda leapt out from underneath the blanket and placed the knife on Shanda's neck. She began interrogating her about the details of her relationship with Amanda, and Melinda only got more and more angry as time passed by. Soon enough, they arrived at the Witches Castle and Shanda was forced from the car, tied up and taken into the building. Once inside, Melinda and her friends stole Shanda's jewelry, including her favorite Mickey Mouse watch. Melinda spoke about how pretty Shanda's hair was, then asked how she would look if she were to cut it all off while running the knife through her hair. One of the girls then pulled a shirt out of the car and brought it into the so-called castle, lighting it on fire just a moment later. Why the girl did this? I have no idea, but the smoke coming from the shirt was so overwhelming that the girls feared someone passing by might notice. So they gathered up Shanda, stowed her away in the car and drove further down the road, eventually towards Madison, near where Laurie lived. Laurie directed the girls to an abandoned logging road that was surrounded by forest and trees. The girls drove deep into the road and when they reached an agreeable location, they pulled Shanda from the car. Shanda was then forced to remove all of her clothes and immediately after, Melinda began to attack her, punching her, kicking her and repeatedly kneeing her in the face. Two of the girls stayed inside the car because they were terrified by what was about to take place, but before long, Melinda coerced the girls to help hold Shanda down while she finished the job. She then pulled out the knife that she had brought along with her and attacked Shanda again, then used a rope that she'd found to ensure that the deed was done. Once this night of terror was seemingly over, the girls then loaded Shanda back into the trunk of the car and drove to Laurie's house to clean up and get a few drinks to cool off. While they were inside the house, they began to hear Shanda screaming from the trunk of the car. Laurie immediately sprang into action, grabbing a paring knife and quickly making her way back to the trunk of the car. She then came back inside, cleaned up again and then Laurie and Melinda got back into the car and began to cruise the local country streets. It was about 2.30 a.m. at this point. Before long, they heard Shanda calling out from the trunk once again. This time, they pulled over and grabbed a tire ire, with Laurie believing she had finally finished the job at this point. It's also been reported that around this time, their attacks took on the more sexual nature, but this isn't something I'm really comfortable discussing, so if these details interest you for whatever reason, I'll let you look up that aspect of the story on your own. When Melinda and Laurie returned home early the next morning, the two girls were still at Laurie's house waiting for them to return. When they asked what had happened to Shanda, Laurie began to laugh and describe the crime in extreme detail, adding that Shanda was still in the trunk of the car. Later that morning, the girls drove to a local gas station and filled their car up with gas. One of the girls went inside and grabbed a two liter Pepsi, pouring out the Pepsi and filling the empty bottle with gasoline. The girls then drove to Lemon Road, north of Madison and pulled Shanda back out of the car. They placed her just off the side of a gravel road, poured the gasoline on her and started a fire. A corner would later reveal that despite what the girls believed, Shanda was still alive at this point. All of the girls returned home after stopping at a local McDonald's and having breakfast along the way. Melinda met up with Amanda later on that day and probably confessed what she had done to Shanda. Amanda obviously didn't believe her at first, but that's when Melinda took her to the trunk of the car where Shanda's hand prints could be seen all over the trunk with her socks still being found inside as well. Amanda was speechless, truly speechless. Melinda then turned to her, swore her love for her and begged Amanda not to tell anyone. Terrified, Amanda agreed. Later on in the morning on January 11th, the morning after the crime took place, two brothers were heading out to the Jefferson Proving Ground to go hunting. Along the way, they noticed something on the side of the road that looked an awful lot like a crime scene but they believed it to be a mannequin that someone had ditched until they got closer. They ran to the nearest phone to call the police as soon as they realized what they had uncovered. The police asked them to return to the scene of the crime and wait on a team of investigators to take their statements. Several state troopers and detectives showed up and began to collect forensic evidence from the scene of the crime. Police initially believed that this was some sort of gang violence, especially considering that the body had been placed in a suggestive pose before being burned and abandoned. They also learned that the victim's face and hands had been a particular point of focus for the assailant as it seemed as though they were purposefully burnt so that the victim couldn't be identified. As all of this was taking place, Shanda's father had just woken up and found out that Shanda wasn't in her room. He looked all over for her but she was nowhere to be found. He called her mother and explained what was going on and they both searched for her all to no avail. By that afternoon, they met with local investigators and filed a missing person report with the Clark County Sheriff. By 8.20 that evening, Hope and Tawny, Melinda's two friends, unexpectedly showed up at the local police station alongside their parents. The two girls were hysterical and could barely even speak. They were eventually able to get out that the victim police had found earlier that day had been none other than Shanda. The girls confessed to everything, telling investigators the entire series of events that had taken place that evening. Several local counties worked together to piece the story together and eventually the Clark County Sheriff was alerted that the missing person report that had been filed earlier that day had officially been solved. Detectives soon obtained dental records and were able to positively identify Shanda. Both Melinda and Lore were arrested the following day while the other two girls were already being held in police custody. By April of 1992, Tawny accepted a plea bargain with police. By September, both Melinda and Lore accepted plea bargains as well. Both Melinda and Lore were later sentenced to 60 years in prison, but rather shockingly they were both paroled after just 26 and 25 years respectively. The two other girls were given much lesser sentences with Hope being given 35 years though she only served 14 and Tawny being sentenced to 20 years but only serving nine. At the end of it all, I really don't know what to make of this case. I usually give you guys my brief input before the end of the story but I just don't know what to say here. Many people may be quick to defend Melinda blaming her actions on her remarkably dark childhood that was filled with abuse and deception and I'll admit, Melinda had a very, very hard time growing up. So much so that Melinda's story would be enough to fuel a video of her own but in the end, Melinda's actions and the actions of her friends are inexcusable. There's no denying that Melinda was fully aware of what she was doing and she was fully aware of the consequences of her choices but she continued with the crime anyway. But particularly disturbing were the actions of Laurie Tackett as it's rumored that she hadn't even met Shanda until the night that she helped claim her life. I wish there was some sort of silver lining here but this just isn't one of those cases. I just sincerely hope that while spending all that time behind bars, the girls were able to truly rehabilitate themselves from the awful disgusting crimes they committed. Maybe somehow they can learn from their terrible choices and become decent people moving forward, however unlikely that may be. It's just terrifying to know that these women are now walking free among us. Thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of True Crime Stories. If you wanna see more true crime documentaries like this, be sure to hit that like button and subscribe. If you'd like to help support the channel, the best way you can do that is simply by leaving a comment below, any comment at all. It helps out the channel a lot more than you may realize. If you wanna help out financially, you can do that by clicking the blue join button below or by picking up a True Crime Stories mug from tynauts.com. But with that, my name is Tynauts and I'll catch you guys in the next video.